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^ LONG? LIFE 



1806 -° 1876. 






Still o'er these scenes my memory wakes, 
And fondly broods with miser care, — 

Time but the impression deeper makes 
As streams their channels deeper wear." 

Burns "To Mary in Heaven. 



-^-'^-^ssf-^*-^- 



COLUMBIA, S. C. 
Charles A. Calvo, Jr., Printer. 
1884. 






'■^ 



Page 36, line 14, for "from " read "for." 

Page 44, line 2cS, for "Thomas" read "Charles." 

Page 46, line 3, for " Harvey " read "Henry." 

Page 67, line 2, insert negro between "India" and "barber." 

Page 67, at the end of the Chapter add the following, which was 
accidentally omitted by the author : 

The Baptist Church was of brick, and fronted on Sumter street^ near 
its intersection with Plain. 

The Methodist Church, a long, low wooden building, stood at the 
corner of Washington and Bull streets, the site of the present church. 
It was succeeded by a brick structure, with galleries on the sides and 
rear, which was burnt by Sherman's vandals in 1865. 

On the removal of the County seat from Granby the old court house 
was bought by the Presbyterian congregation, who had it taken down, 
removed and rebuilt, and converted into a church, in which they wor- 
shiped till their present church was about to be erected, when it became 
the property of Major Niernsee, Avho altered it into the dwelling now 
owned by Mr. J. H. Kinard on Lady street, opposite to its former loca- 
tion. Thus, after serving for the administration of the law and the 
propagation of the Gospel, it was changed into a private residence. 

The Episcopal Church was at its present location, and the Catholics 
and Lutherans had no church in Columbia at that time. 

Page 110, between lines 13 and 14, insert : The chief income in this 
section was from lumber sawed at their mills and rafted down Edisto 
River to the coast. 



Page 17, line 15, for " 1815" read " 1816." 

Page 2()6, line 24, for "Isaac A." read "James A. 



Entered :»ccording to Act of Congress, in the year 1884, 

By Edwin J. Scott, 
In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTORY. 



PAGE. 

Aim and Scope of the Work 3 

CHAPTER II. 

HISTORICAL EVENTS ON THE CONTINENT OF EUROPE. 

Napoleon Bonaparte — Louis the Eighteenth — Charles the Tenth — 
Revolution of 1830— Louis Phillippe— Revolution and Republic 
in 1848 — Louis Napoleon — The German Empire— Its Conquest 
of Austria and France 4 

CHAPTER III. 

GREAT BRITAIN. 

George The Third— Poets, Novelists, Essayists and Critics— George 
The Fourth— Trial of Queen Caroline— William The Fourth- 
Reform Bill — Queen Victoria 7 

CHAPTER IV. 

SUMTER, 1806 TO 1811. 

Black River — Presbyterian Church — Indigo — Cotton — Specie Cur- 
rency — Wells— Manchester — Its School House — Ball Battery — 
Drinking and Gambling — African Negroes — Yankee Peddlers — 
Catawba Indians 9 



U CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER V. 

CAMDEN, 1811 TO 1817. 

Rev. George Reid's Academy — War of 1812 — Colonel William 
McWillie and His Son — Chapman Levy — General Blair — Henry 
G. Nixon — Boys' Artillery Company — Insurrection of Negroes — 
Cruelty of Criminal Laws — Baron DeKalb — Church, Preachers 
and Leading Citizens 14 



CHAPTER VI. 

COLUMBIA, 1817 TO 1822. 

Departure from Camden and Arrival in Columbia — Apprenticeship 
and Return to Camden — Emigration Westward — Importance 
of a Wafer — Trip to Augusta — John McLean — Race Between 
Argyle and Bascom — Robert Waddell and Colonel Preston — 
Hugh McLean, H. I. Caughman and Sid Johnston — Sojourn at 
Lexington — Henry Shultz — Toasts 19 

CHAPTER VII. 

. COLUMBIA— CONTINUED. 

Introduction of Steam with Its Effects — Magnetic Telegraph — Ex- 
press Companies — Waterworks, Gas Works and Other Improve- 
ments and Inventions — Changes in Habits, Utensils, Diseases, 
&c. — Roads, Streets and Ferries — Drowning of Yoimg Blocker — 
Markets and Butchers 29 



CHAPTER VIII. 

COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. 

Business Houses and Their Occupants— John D. Brown and Family— 
D. and J. J. Faust— Terence, James and John C. O'Hanlon— The 
Bryces — Daniel Morgan — Adam Edgar — Dr. F. W. Green — Dr. 
S. Percival — John Parr — The Purvises and Hunts — Major Benj, 
Hart — Old State House — Isaac Frazier and Isaac H. Coleman — 
Little Levy — R. E. Russell and His Garden , . . 34 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER IX. 

COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. 

Main Street, East Side— Dr. Sam Green— Business Men and Their 
Houses— From Gervais to Lady Street— From Lady to Wasliing- 
ton — From Washington to Plain, Including the Court House — 
From Plain to Camden or Taylor — From Taylor to Blanding — 
From Blanding to Laurel 42 

CHAPTER X. 

COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. 

West Side of Main Street — Ainsley Hall — From Laurel to Blanding 
Street — From Blanding to Taylor— From Taylor to Plain — An- 
drew Wallace — Columbia Insurance Company— From Plain 
Street to Barrett's Store — David Coulter and Family — Benjamin 
Rawls — McCord and Nott — Shipwrecks — William L. Lewis 50 

CHAPTER XL 

COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. 

Private Dwellings and Their Occupants— The Beards, Taylors, Hamp- 
tons, Wades, DeSaussures, Notts, Starks, Guignards, Herbe- 
monts. Fishers, Chappells, McGowans and Others — First Theatri- 
cal Performance — C!ircus and Ball Room 59 

CHAPTER XII. 

COLUMBIA — CONTINUED. 

Remarkable Negroes — Lawyers — James and Maxcy Gregg — Abram 
Blanding — Columbia Canal — State Road — Saluda Factory — Rail- 
road Bank — Water Works — Chapman Levy — Trial of William 
Taylor— Duel — Academies, Schools and Watering Places 67 

CHAPTER XIIL 

DISTINGUISHED CLERGYMEN. 

William Capers, James O. Andrew, Samuel Dunwoody, Jonathan 
Maxcy and Basil Manly 73 



IV , CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIV. 

DISTRICT AND TOWN OFFICERS. 

Sheriff, Clerk and Ordinary, Tax Collector, Crier of Court, Intend- 
ant, Chief of Police and Congressman — Flush Times — Prices 
of Produce — Tobacco Inspection— Credit Sj'stem — Boats — Goods 
and Their Prices 77 

CHAPTER XV. 

Jacob and Judah Barrett — John G. Dunlap — Henry Hook — Murder 
of John Arthur — Henry Voss and John H. Eiflert 82 

CHAPTER XVI. 

LEXINGTON, 1822 TO 1839. 

The Village — George Haltiwanger — A. H. Fort — Jacob Drafts — John 
Meetze — Mrs. Corley — The Well Curb — Ephraim Corlej^ — Adam 
Mayer, Mrs. Stewart and the Hendrixes 87 

CHAPTER XVII. 

R. H. Goldthwaite and Allen C. Stillman — The Court House — Bush 
Arbor and St. Peter's Church — Jesse Drafts — The German 
Lutherans, Their Habits and Characteristics, Their Negroes, 
Their Clothing, Food and Furniture, Their Honesty, Fights and 
Weddings — Game — Superstition — Edgefield Ghost , 93 

CHAPTER XVIIi. 

William Jones and John Caldwell — My Election as Tax Collector 
and Marriage — Stenography and Bookkeeping — Bishop Capers 
and Mr. Petigru— Revs. Thomas Rail, Godfrey, Dreher and 
Yost Metze — John Snyder 102 

CHAPTER XIX. 

SOME LEADING MEN OF THE DISTRICT. 

West Caughman, John W. Lee, John Quattlebaum, Daniel Rambo, 
Tommy Williamson, Simon and Peter Redmund, John Hoover, 
Muller & Senn, John Threewitts — Old Granby and Its Inhab- 
itants—A Tale of a Shirt 108 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XX. 

THE DUTeil FORK. 

George Lorick's — " My Pally Hurts Me " — Spring Hill — Thomas Boyd, 
Senior— Lindler as a Bridegroom— Jacob Counts— Henry Smith 
and His Mudderwit — Shealy's — Tom Frick and His Faith — Fred 
Wise — Spinning Flax— Grace Before Meat 114 

CHAPTER XXI. 

Amos Banks — Buckeye Bayles — Whitman, the Blacksmith — Paysin- 
ger and Bates — Deep Swimming — Dominick and His Gun — 
Drunken Men and Hogs — Nicknames — Verses 118 

CHAPTER XXII. 

Queer Sayings and Doings — Lewis Stack as a Plough Horse — Luke 
Manning and His Duel — Lowry, the Surveyor — Daniel and 
Jeremy Wingard and Jesse Floyd 123 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

Judges and Lawyers — Judge Gantt and Judge O'Neall — Tom Hen- 
drix and Isaac Vansant — Judge Butler and Barney Livingston — 
Old Grig Clark— Cases in Court— Joseph Kennerly's Widow- 
Dunning vs. Permenter, Breach of Marriage Contract— Meetze 
and Singletary— Arson and Forgery 130 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

Lafayette's Visit to Columbia — Death of Jefferson and Adams — 
Nullification Convention — John Randolph, Henry Clay and 
Thomas Ritchie — Florida War — Klbler. Sims and Petigru — 
Lutheran Seminary — Rev. Dr. Hazelius 13?' 

CHAPTER XXV. 

r 

RETURN TO COLUMBIA. 

Officers and Directors of the Commercial Bank — The Branch Bank — 
New Merchants and Business Men — The Clergy — The College — 
The Academies — The Seminary — Receipts of Cotton — Election 
in 1840— Sidney Park 140 



VI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

THE WAR WITH MEXICO. 

Colonel Butler, Lieutenant-Colonel Dlckerson and Major Gladden— 
My Assignment— Robert Latta, John A. Crawford, John Cald- 
well and Henry Lyons — The Freshet of 1852 — My Election as 
Cashier — The Bank Suspension of 185T — The College Riot 156 

CHAPTER XXVn. 

THE CONFEDERATE WAR. 

The Central Relief Association — Joseph Daniel Pope — My Visit to 
the Army in Virginia — The Burning of Columbia 168 

CHAPTER XXVin. 

My Trip Up the River — End of the War — Visit to Salt Works — Elec- 
tion to the Legislature — Copartnership with George W. Wil- 
liams—Bank Robbery— Connection with Southern, Baldwin and 
Shiver — Reconstruction and Radical Rule — Failure in Health 
and Business — Seven Spring Mass — Rhymes 195 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS 



LONG LIFE. 



" Old people tell of li'Jiat tliey have seen and done, children of 7vhat 
they are doing, anil fools of 7vhat thev intend to do^ 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTORY. 
Aim and Scope of the Work. 

However humble or obscure one's Hfe may be, be can 
hardly attain the age of eighty without witnessing and parti- 
cipating in some exciting and interesting scenes and becom- 
ing acquainted with many remarkable and distinguished 
persons. And when too old and infirm to serve his family or 
the community in any other way, he may, if blest with an 
ordinary memory, amuse or instruct them somewhat by re- 
calling and recording some of the circumstances and trans- 
actions that have occurred in his time, together with the 
changes made thereby. This I propose to do. And whereas 
any statement of facts may be strengthened and confirmed by 
a knowledge of the manner in which they became known, 
my own experience shall be given whenever requisite to verify 
or simplify the narrative about to be related. 

The present century has witnessed many startling and im- 
portant events, producing a greater revolution in all the phases 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



of human society than has occurred in the same length of time 
at any previous period of the world's history. Who can 
enumerate, for instance, the many improvements made in the 
arts and sciences, in government and education, in law and 
literature, in medicine and surgery, in agriculture and its im- 
plements, in mechanical inventions and chemical discoveries, 
all tending to promote the comforts and conveniences, sup- 
ply the needs, advance the interests, and contribute to the 
welfare of the race? Without attempting at present to par- 
ticularize or estimate the effects of these improvements on 
the character and condition of our people, which shall be 
done to some extent hereafter, a brief review of the most 
prominent public matters shall first be traced, and then a 
sketch of private affairs, with the great alterations in our 
business habits and domestic manners and customs, inter- 
spersed with local incidents and anecdotes, will form the 
subject of the following series. 



CHAPTER II. 



HISTORICAL EVENTS ON THE CONTINENT OF 
EUROPE. 

Napoleon Bonaparte — Louis the Eighteenth — Charees the Tenth — 
Revolution of 1830— Louis Philippe— Revolution and Republic 
IN 1848— Louis Napoleon— The German Empire— Its Conquest of 
Austria and France. 

We will first glance at the principal historical events, be- 
ginning with France. 

The wonderful career of Napoleon Bonaparte, perhaps, ex- 
ceeds in novelty and interest that recorded of any other 
character in history or fiction. His rise from a private 
station to supreme power without the aid of wealth or in- 
fluential fiimily connections; his creation (for it can be called 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



no less) of peace and order out of the chaos of conflicting 
and fermenting elements left by the great French Revolution ; 
his successive conquest of all the kingdoms of Continental 
Europe, until his fatal and insane invasion of Russia, with 
the horrors and sufferings of the retreat from Moscow; his 
waning fortunes at Dresden and Leipsic; his desperate but 
futile struggle to protect Paris; his defeat, abdication and 
exile to Elba; his sudden and unexpected return, causing the 
flight of Louis the Eighteenth; his busy and brilliant reign 
of the Hundred Days; his final overthrow at Waterloo; his 
vain attempt to escape to America; his banishment and death 
at St. Helena, wdie^nce after many years his remains were 
removed to Paris and received with great pomp by Louis 
Philippe, and where, in accordance with his last will and 
prayer, they '^repose on the banks of the Seine, among the 
people whom he had loved so well." Surely no more stir- 
ring and romantic life is found in the annals of our race. 
Such were his power and influence that his history was that 
of Europe for nearly twenty years ; and Allison, the historian, 
his bitter and prejudiced enemy, declared that all Europe 
would fly to arms at the display ^of his old grey coat. 

I distinctly recollect reading the account of the battle of 
Waterloo in the Camden newspaper at the time ; and if the 
old Cornwallis mansion still remained, in which I went to 
school, and which was burnt by Sherman's troops in 1865, I 
could go to within three feet of the spot where I read the 
paper — one whole broadside being filled with the list of 
killed and wounded general officers. 

After the fall of Napoleon, Louis the Eighteenth was re- 
stored to the kingdom by the Allied Powers, and was suc- 
ceeded at his death by the Comte D'Artois, under the title of 
Charles the Tenth. Him the people dethroned and drove 
out by the Revolution of 1830, under the lead of Guizot, 
Thiers and others. This was in the same week that witnessed 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



the commencement of a still greater revolution — though of a 
different kind — in the opening of the railroad between Liver- 
pool and Manchester, and the successful application of steam 
power to locomotion by land ; Mr, Huskisson, the great 
British statesman, being unfortunately run over and killed on 
the trial trip. 

Louis Philippe, then elected King of the French, was a 
son of the dissolute and unprincipled L'Egalite, Philip Duke 
of Orleans, who completed his infamy by voting in the 
National Convention for the conviction and execution of his 
kinsman, Louis the Sixteenth, and ended his life not long 
after under the guillotine, by authority of the Revolutionary 
Tribunal. 

By the Revolution of 1848, Louis Philippe, the citizen 
King, was forced to vacate the throne and flee to England 
for safety. Then followed the stormy and short-lived Repub- 
lic under Lamartine, Ledra Rollin and their associates ; the 
escape of Louis Napoleon from the fortress at Ham; his 
flight to England; his subsequent return and election to the 
Chamber of Deputies; his overthrow of the Republic and 
his assumption of the Empire with the title of Napoleon the 
Third. 

The Revolution of 1848 extended over the Continent, 
"with fear of change perplexing monarchs," who quieted 
their subjects for the time by promises of reform, which, 
however, were soon falsified. The subsequent course of 
events, resulting in the consolidation of the German Empire 
by annexing to the Kingdom of Prussia the petty principali- 
ties formerly represented in the Diet; by its conquest in suc- 
cession of Austria and France, with the defeat, capture and 
death of Louis Napoleon, are too well known to deserve 
further notice. Thus the French ship of state, resembling. 
" a stormy land, a stormy sea before her," was tossed and 
buffeted by the restless and tumultuous currents of foreign 
war and domestic factions. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER III. 

GREA T BRITAIN. 



George the Third — Poets, Novelists, Essayists and Critics — 
George the Fourth — Trial of Queen Caroline — William the 
Fourth— Reform Bill— Queen Victoria. 

Meantime England, having seen and paid dearly for the 
folly of intermeddling in the affairs of her neighbors, was 
steadily, if not rapidly, growing in wealth and power — undis- 
turbed, save by an occasional gust from the coast of Ireland, 
whose people she had shamefully misgoverned and oppressed — 
increasing her population and territory, extending her com- 
merce and manufactures, and utilizing and profiting by all 
the agencies and appliances that characterize and enrich an 
industrious and a prosperous community. My memory goes 
back to the close of the reign of George the Third, under 
the Prince Regent, an era distinguished by the remarkable 
and splendid galaxy of writers in poetry, fiction and criti- 
cism — Byron, Scott, Moore, Campbell, Rogers, Wordsworth, 
Coleridge, Southey, Shelley and Keats, Jeffrey, Brougham, 
Sydney Smith, Christopher I^orth, (John Wilson,) and 
Charles Lamb — who illuminated the whole horizon of polite 
literature, and, after the lapse of so many years, still shine 
with the brightness of morning, fair as the moon, clear as the 
sun, and, in their influence on taste and sentiment, more 
powerful than an army with banners. They actually created 
new tastes and erected different standards of merit from those 
previously existing, while charming and surprising their own 
and succeeding generations by the beauty, variety and abun- 
dance of their productions. Many of these I devoured with 
avidity and delight at their first appearance, once sitting up 
a whole night with one of Scott's novels. 

To fully appreciate our indebtedness to them, we must re- 
member that from Burns to Scott and Byron — a period of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



some twenty years — no poetry deserving the name had ap- 
peared, whilst the next twenty were enriched by the list of 
authors given above; that the fashionable novels were mostly 
a mere mass of indecency, stupidity and sickly sentiment- 
ality, until the publication of Scott's, which at once secured 
a popularity that has never ceased and scarcely diminished, 
notwithstanding the host of competitors that has since 
entered the lists; and that in criticism the staid and correct, 
but hard and dry, utterances of Blair and Lord Karnes were 
superseded by the wit and wisdom, the common sense and 
audacity, of Blackwood and the Edinburgh Review. 

At the death of George the Third, George the Fourth 
ascended the throne. He created intense excitement through- 
out the Kingdom by refusing to allow the coronation of his 
consort. Queen Caroline, and, as an excuse or justification for 
such refusal, by instigating her scandalous prosecution and 
public trial on a charge of adultery. Her counsel — Brougham 
and Denman — in a spirit of manliness and independence 
that was above all praise, in defiance of the monarch's per- 
sonal wishes, and of the influence of his power and patron- 
age, faithfully and successfully defended their client, whilst 
fearlessly exposing his conduct and character. 

After him came William the Fourth, and then Queen 
Victoria, whose reign continues to the present date. In the 
meantime the matters of most interest were the passage of 
the Reform Bill in 1832, regulating and extending the suf- 
frage; the repeal of the Corn Laws; the Irish agitation under 
Daniel O'Connell; the Crimean War; the Sepoy Rebellion, 
and others too recent and unimportant for further remark. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER IV. 

SUMTER, iSod TO iSii. 

Black Riveu Presbyterian Church — Indigo — Cotton — Specie Cur- 
rency— Wells— Manchester— Its School House— Ball Battery- 
Drinking and Gambling— African Negroes— Yankee Peddlers— 
Catawba Indians. 

At home, my first recollections found me at Sumterville, 
where my father kept a tavern in 1806, when I was about 
three years old. To get me out of the way at Court time, 
when the house was full of guests, I was sent to the home of 
my grandfather, VVm. Anderson, some ten miles East of the 
village, beyond Black River, between it and the Brick Church, 
(Presbyterian,) which then stood nearly, if not exactly, on 
the beautiful spot occupied by the present Salem Presbyterian 
Brick Church, Black River. The river swamp where we 
crossed it was half a mile wide, crowded with large trees, and 
had a high bridge over the main current of the stream, which 
was reached by a causewayed road through the black and 
sluggish water on either side, so narrow and crooked that a 
passenger could see but a few yards ahead; always looking 
gloomy and threatening, often hazardous and sometimes im- 
passable. Now it has a broad embankment, above the highest 
freshets, through which the river flows under three or four 
substantial bridges, with strong hand-rails that give a sense 
of perfect security to the traveler. This valuable improve- 
ment is due to the skill and energy of my deceased friend 
Matthew E. Muldrow, formerly Commissioner of Roads. 

Indigo was then raised in all that region for sale and for 
domestic use. It grew wild in the woods, attained the height 
of one and a half to two feet, and had bluish green leaves. 
At the proper season the plants were cut off near the ground 
and immersed in water to extract the coloring matter, which 
sank by its own weight to the bottom of the vat, when the 



10 KAN DOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



water was drawn off, the sediment left to dry and harden, 
and then cut into squares, forming the finest blue dye known 
to the world. To make a first rate article the water was 
sometimes drawn from one vat to another, stirred and boiled. 
When broken, the cleavage in good indigo was smooth and 
showed a copper-colored tinge. A knowing old lady, in 
telling another how to judge its quality, said : "Take a clean 
new cedar or cypress piggin, fill it three-thirds full with clear 
spring water, put into it a lump of indigo as big as an egg, 
and, if good, it will either sink or SAvim, I have really for- 
gotten which." I have seen the vats or tanks when in use, 
and the remains of some of them still stand in the neighbor- 
hood. 

There being no cotton gins at the time, the cultivation of 
that staple was quite limited. Families in the country usually 
spent the long Winter evenings in social converse, while 
picking cotton from the seed with their fingers, and seated 
around a big log fire, in which a plenty of pindars and sweet 
potatoes were roasting. The growth of cane in all low 
places, together with other plants, afforded a capital range 
for stock, and planters raised large numbers of beeves and 
hogs for the Charleston market, whither they were driven 
every winter. They also sold their indigo in the city, bring- 
ing home the proceeds in Spanish silver coin, which com- 
posed almost the entire currency before the Bank of the State 
came into existence in December, 1812. This was a very 
clumsy and inconvenient medium of exchange, especially for 
large amounts and for merchants in North Carolina and other 
distant points who dealt in Charleston and were forced to 
carry their money in boxes fitting under the seats of the sul- 
keys in which they traveled, so as to be taken out at night 
and put back in the morning. Goods, except upon the rivers, 
were hauled by wagons, and freight on heavy articles like 
iron and salt was enormous! v hicdi. Mr. Robert Latta laid 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 11 



the foundation of his immense fortune by wagoning goods 
from Philadelphia to Yorkville, where he did business during 
the war. Wagons, for safety and company, went together in 
large numbers, and it was not unusual to see a dozen or more 
in a gang, the jingling of the bells on their horses' heads 
making '* music in the sinners' ears." 

The wells in this section and most of the low country were 
quite a curiosity to strangers. The pond cypress, unlike that 
of the swamps, has the peculiarity of being hollow nearly its 
entire length, thus forming a tube, sometimes two or three 
feet in diameter, surrounded by a rim of wood two to four 
inches thick. These are cut into sections, cleaned, cleared 
out and converted into well curbs, bee gums, ash stands, &c. 
The knees — so called — when inverted and fitted with handles, 
make the best of buckets, which never leak nor shrink, and 
hardly ever decay or wear out; so that the boy was not far 
wrong who said that cypress timber lasted always, for his 
father had tried it twice. I know of one such curb that after 
being in daily use upwards of fifty years is as sound as it was 
at first. In that low, flat country, some of the wells during 
a wet season require banking around the curb to keep the 
water from flowing out on the surface, yet when freshly drawn 
it is cool, pleasant and healthful. 

I was too young to take much notice of fashions in dress, 
but young ladies at balls wore sharp-toed morocco slippers of 
all the colors of the rainbow, and gentlemen looked particu- 
larly neat and genteel in fair-topped boots, worn with knee 
breeches, and having a band of smooth yellow leather four 
or five inches wide at top. They also wore white powder in 
their hair on public occasions. 

From Sumter we removed to Manchester on the main road 
from Camden to Charleston. This village was settled, for 
the sake of health and society, by the Moores, Ramseys, 
Ballards and other rich planters who owned lands on the 



12 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Wateree River. Besides their residences, it had a tavern, 
kept by my father, a shoe shop, tailor shop, blacksmith shop, 
a school house and two or three stores — the principal one 
owned by Duke Goodman, who soon after went to Charleston, 
where he became a leading cotton factor and Methodist 
exhorter. He was said to have once confounded the two pro- 
fessions and shown which was uppermost in his mind, by giv- 
ing out a hymn as short staple, instead of short metre. But 
this might have been a mere piece of fun or slander; for slan- 
der and fun were as much relished then as now. 

The school house, built of logs, had a stand at the Eastern 
end, that served for a pulpit whenever a stray Methodist 
preacher happened to call and hold divine service, which was 
done by at least one of them in my time, who declared that 
he was not ashamed to be called "old bawling Jenkins." He 
was widely known as a zealous Christian, had been a faithful 
soldier in the Revolutionary War, and bore an excellent char- 
acter in every respect, which together caused him to be 
elected doorkeeper of the Senate in his extreme old age. In 
that building I first went to school, my teacher being a Mr. 
Rivers from the low country. Many years afterwards, when 
visiting my friends in Salem, I was delayed several hours at 
the Manchester station on the Wilmington Railroad, about a 
mile below the old village, and walked up to it, where I found 
but two houses remaining — that formerly occupied by my 
father, and the old school house, looking both inside and out 
exactly as I had left it half a century previously — the pulpit, 
seats and benches all in their places, and so it may be to this 
day. A short distance South of the village was a ball bat- 
tery and alley, where the young men played fives, sometimes 
at match games with those from other places, as is now prac- 
tised in base ball, with the addition of considerable sums 
being occasionally staked on the result. Stephen D. Miller, 
afterwards Governor, was one of the best players in the State. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 13 



The battery was a smooth wooden wall, perhaps forty feet 
long by thirty in height, with the alley of corresponding 
length and breadth, carefully leveled, tightly packed, and 
swept clean. Some of the villagers and neighbors met every 
day at a store, where the card table was brought out into the 
piazza soon after breakfast, and gambling went on till night, 
winding up, now and then, with a supper and ball, to which 
the young ladies were invited, and that lasted to a late hour. 
This, with drinking freely, was their regular habit week after 
week, varied by quarter races, feats of strength and activity, 
and an occasional fist fight. The natural consequence fol- 
lowed: in a few years they were bankrupt in health, fortune 
and morals. 

The slave trade was then in operation and many Africans 
were brought into the District by the planters. I saw quite a 
number of them, bright-looking, smooth-faced, and slender 
in form, but clean-limbed and very active. So fond of 
whisky were they, that for a dram one would stand with his 
back against a post or wall and let a strong man strike him in 
the forehead with his fist. 

The occasional, and always welcome, advent of a Yankee 
peddler, driving a good horse in a covered wagon, supplied 
families with tin ware and other light goods. And a few 
Catawba Indians visited us every winter, with bows and 
arrows, moccasins, and earthenware pots and pans of their 
own manufacture, some very neatly made and prettily colored ; 
the women carrying infants wrapped in blankets on their 
backs, so that the little ones could peep out over their 
mothers' shoulders. To complete my reminiscences of Man- 
chester, it may be stated that we had a bright comet and 
several severe earthquakes; that shad were so abundant as to 
sell by the hundred at 12^ cents each; that for health's 
sake my brothers and myself were given a small quantity of 
whisky before breakfast every morning, and that I had learned 



U RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



to play cards before I could read. It would seem that noth- 
ing but a special providence or a lucky chance saved me from 
becoming both a drunkard and a gambler, for certainly no 
one ever had a fairer start in that direction. But my task is 
to relate facts, not to moralize on them. 



CHAPTER V. 

CAMDEN, 1811 TO 1817. 

Rev. George Reid's Academy— War of 1812— Colonel William 
Mg Willie and His Son — Chapman Levy — General Blair — Henry 
G. Nixon— Boys' Artillery Company— Insurrection or Negroes- 
Cruelty of Criminal Laws— Baron DeKalb— Churches, Preach- 
#ERS AND Leading Citizens. 

In iSir my father removed to Camden, where I was sent 
for six years to an Academy for girls and boys, kept by 
Rev. George Reid, a portly, pock-marked Presbyterian 
clergyman, of much experience and very superior attain- 
ments as a classical teacher, a rigid disciplinarian, who used 
the rod and the ruler unsparingly and impartially whenever 
he thought it necessary. His favorite method of inflicting 
punishment was to lay the delinquent across his lap, face 
downwards, and then paddle him with a broad, flat ruler, 
leaving marks, in some cases, that were visible for weeks. 

Public opinion, in these latter days, seems to condemn 
corporal punishment and the mingling of the sexes in our 
schools. But, while disclaiming any competency to decide 
on these questions, I confidently affirm that neither the spirit 
of the one sex nor the modesty and purity of the other was 
unfavorably affected by these practices as then enforced, and 
that, so far as my knowledge and belief extend, no undue 
familiarity between them ever was reported or suspected. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 15 



Under Mr. Reid, I took his regular course in Latin, viz., 
Ruddiman's Grammar, Corderii, .^vsop's Fables, Erasmus, 
Cornelius Nepos, Caesar, Virgil and Horace, and was a year 
or so in the Creek, as my old friend, John Summer, said of 
his son Adam. He had, as assistant in the English depart- 
ment, C. J. Shannon, subsequently a leading merchant and 
father of the lamented William M. Shannon; and later, in 
the classics, William K. Clowney, of Union, who afterwards 
was a tutor in the South Carolina College and represented 
his District in Congress. My classmates were Isaac H. Smith, 
David Evander Reid, son of the teacher, William O. Nixon, 

Henry I. Abbott, William Trent, and part of the time 

Brevard and Adamson. I have not seen or heard of 

any of them for many years, and, as all were older than my- 
self, probably not one survives. 

During this period the war of 1812 was declared, and I 
well recollect the rejoicings, illuminations, torch-light pro- 
cessions and paradings around the liberty pole that stood on 
Main street, a little South of Havis's tavern, at the news of 
every victory over the British, and particularly at the procla- 
mation of peace. 

An affecting scene was presented at the separation from 
their families and friends of the volunteer regiment on its 
departure for the coast under command of old Colonel Wil- 
liam McWillie, of Lancaster, with his son William, my school- 
mate, as Adjutant. The latter, some years later, was Presi- 
dent of the Branch Bank of Camden, and after his removal 
to Mississippi became Governor of that State. He was said 
to have been the father of twenty children by one wife. 

Camden contributed two companies to this regiment — the 
Rifles, Captain Chapman Levy, and the Artillery, Captain 
James Blair — not the giant General and member of Congress, 
of the same name, who shot Tom Evans in a duel, nearly 
killed Duff Green with a cudgel, and finally blew out his own 



16 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



brains at Washington. Evans's excuse for missing so fii'iv a 
mark was that the muzzle of Blair's pistol looked as big as a 
barrel. General Blair was the second of Hopkins in his duel 
with my former school-fellow, the eloquent and talented 
Henry G. Nixon, at Augusta, where the latter was shot through 
the heart at the first fire, his second being Governor John 
Lide Wilson, author of the " Code of Honor," who had him- 
self stood fire in a similar rencontre with a cigar in his 
mouth. 

At a brigade encampment, in Camden, Blair's enormous 
size attracted the rapt attention of all the idle boys, who 
watched his movements and hung upon his words with won- 
der and admiration. He showed forbearance and consider- 
ation on that occasion by declining to compete with a con- 
ceited and contentious young officer, whose vanity induced 
him to make an exhibition of his strength and endurance, on 
the ground that it might mortify the young man or lead to a 
quarrel. In a very different spirit he provoked a challenge 
from James H. Hammond, (afterwards Governor,) in a news- 
paper discussion. On the arrival of the principals and their 
seconds at the appointed place in North Carolina, Blair in- 
vited the other party to visit him at his lodgings on the morn- 
ing of the day when the fight was to come off, and when they 
came asked all to take a drink, which was done. In a few 
minutes he proposed to repeat the dose — in his words to 
"black the other eye," — but when Hammond rose to com- 
ply, his second, Colonel P. M. Butler, (also Governor after- 
wards,) vetoed the proposition, saying that they had come 
there to settle a serious difficulty; that his principal was un- 
accustomed to taking spirits before breakfast, and that he 
should drink no more till the affair was over. An amicable 
adjustment was made in the course of the day. My remem- 
brance of the big General closes with the statement that I 
saw liim, William Dravton and* Mitchell, members of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 17 



Congress, burnt in effigy by a mob in the Main street of 
Columbia, in the days of Nullification, Blair being repre- 
sented by a bale of hay, with head, legs and feet attached. 
He occupied so much space in the public view that a slighter 
notice of him would have been unbecoming and dispropor- 
tioned. 

The boys in our academy formed a uniformed artillery com- 
pany, with two pieces resembling cannon, turned out of wood, 
painted like brass, and mounted on wheels, having musket 
barrels in the center, and touch-holes corresponding with 
those in the guns, so that they fired very well, and we were 
highly complimented by the famous war Governor, David R. 
Williams, on our appearance in line at a regimental or 
brigade review in Camden. 

The whole community was greatly excited in July, 1815, 
by the discovery of an intended insurrection of the negroes, 
which was fixed for the Fourth. They were so confident of 
success that the ring-leader had selected and named the 
young lady who was to be his future wife. The jail was 
crowded with suspected participants and guarded by armed 
men day and night for some weeks. _ I saw four or five of 
them hanged at one time and another afterwards upon the 
same gallows. 

As showing the severity of our laws in those days, I will 
mention that I stood by while the Deputy Sheriff of Kershaw 
branded a man with a hot iron on both cheeks and in the 
forehead and then cut off his ears with a dull knife; and 
that some years later I saw a white man receive twenty-five 
stripes on his bare back, at the public whipping post, on three 
or four successive sale days, for horse stealing, that offense 
being at one time punishable by death on the gallows. And 
it was a strange fact that this crime was committed as often 
while threatened with capital punishment as before or after. 



18 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



I played frequently on the grave of the Baron DeKalb, in 
the middle of a lonely old field at the Southwest part of the 
town. It was surmounted by a plain brick structure, three 
or four feet high, covered by a white stone slab, with an in- 
scription eulogizing his character and services. The corner- 
stone of a more suitable monument to the memory of this 
noble German, who, at the battle near Camden, sacrificed 
his life in our cause, was laid in a more central location by 
Lafayette, on his visit to the State in 1825, with imposing 
Masonic ceremonies, and his remains were afterwards re- 
moved and interred at the same spot. According to Weems's 
Life of Marion, he received eleven wounds. 

Of the clergy, I remember, besides Mr. Reid, my teacher. 

Revs. Isaac Smith, Bond English, a one-eyed man, 

Berry, and Mr. Mathis, Ordinary, who preached occasionally, 
all Methodists. The leading citizens were the Canteys, Ches- 
nuts, McRaes, Kershaws, Langs, Deases, Nixons, Abbotts, 
Douglasses, Dobys, Carters, Reynolds, Whitakers, Blandings, 
Boykins, Kenneciys, Warrens and others. Matt Wiggins was 

Sheriff part of the time; Mickle, Tax Collector; 

Carter, Congressman, and Phineas Thornton, Postmaster. 
Camden had three churches — Methodist, Presbyterian and 
Baptist. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 19 



CHAPTER VI. 

COLUMBIA, 1S17 TO 1S22. 

My Departure from Camden and Arrival in Columbia — Apprentice- 
ship AND Return to Camden— Emigration Westward— Impor- 
tance OF A Wafer— Trip to Augusta— John McLean— Match 
Race Between Argyle and Bascom — Robert Waddell and 
Colonel Preston — Hugh McLean, H. I. Caughman and Sid, 
Johnson— Return to Lexington— Henry Shultz— Toasts. 

Nothing further of general interest occurred during my 
stay in Camden, and now I hope to be excused for giving a 
hasty sketch of my future movements as connected with and 
requisite to a proper understanding of what follows. 

My poor dear mother died in 1815, and after boarding in 
the family of James McKenzie, at McRae's Mill, about a 
mile from the town, I finally quit school in September, 1817, 
at the age of fourteen, and came to Columbia, where I was 
bound as an apprentice for six years to Jacob Barrett, a 
Jewish merchant, whose store stood on the site of that now 
occupied by the Stanleys. On the day appointed for my 
departure from McKenzie's, when the hour arrived for me to 
bid the family farewell, the old lady (his wife) began to 
lament at our separation and declared that she would as soon 
part from one of her own children. This so completely over- 
came me that the tears streamed from my eyes, and my heart 
swelled up into my throat till it seemed as if I must suffocate. 
It so happened that I was prevented from going on that day 
and returned to the house till the morrow. Then, at the 
appointed hour, to avoid a repetition of the distressing scene, 
I stole out unperceived at the back door and fled as if for my 
life. I never saw or heard from one of them again. 

With Barrett I remained upwards of four years, when, com- 
pletely tired out and disgusted by his continued ill-treatment, 
notwithstanding my faithful and unrequited service, and 



20 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



being old enough to think and act for myself, I decided, once 
for all, to run away. This decision was carried into effect at 
midnight on the 20th of January, 1822, when, under a bright 
moon riding high in the heavens, and in a freezing atmos- 
phere, with a handkerchief in my hand containing all the 
clothing I possessed, except what was on me, I bade farewell 
to my feliow apprentice, John G. Dunlap, and took the road 
to Camden, where my father and one of my brothers still 
resided. Out at Taylor's (now Dent's) mill the water was 
above the foot-boards, and I was forced to wade, but its depth 
did not exceed eighteen inches. After getting out, however, 
it froze on me till I reached a camp of people moving to the 
West, where I sat down, dried, warmed and rested. The 
road from the Eastern border of this State and North Caro- 
lina was then daily thronged with a continual stream of vehi- 
cles of every conceivable class and description, laden with 
women, children and household stuff, and accompanied by 
their owners on horseback or afoot, with their negroes, dogs, 
and sometimes cattle, all bound for the new lands in Georgia, 
Alabama and Mississippi. The owner of the camp where I 
stopped kindly offered me a passage to Mississippi free of 
charge, but I was bent on continuing towards Camden, not 
without the secret hope of being overtaken by Charles 
Young's Theatrical Company, which, after performing all 
the winter in Barrett's back store, and thus making my 
acquaintance, was preparing to leave Columbia the next day. 
If they had gone to Camden my intention was, with the con- 
sent of the manager, to join them and become an actor, one 
whose profession, to my youth and inexperience, seemed par- 
ticularly attractive and enjoyable. They went some other 
way, and I kept the road before me, having to break the ice 
with my naked feet next morning in crossing a shallow but 
rather wide stream. Late in the day I arrived at Camden in 
wretched plight, my feet blistered, my joints sore and stiff- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 21 



ened, and my entire energies exhausted by fatigue and loss 
of sleep. From this condition, however, I soon recovered. 
Failing to find em-ployment in Camden, I obtained money 
enough from some of my relatives to pay my fare to Augusta 
in the stage, whither I set out about the middle of February, 
leaving behind me in the postofifice a letter offering me just 
such a situation as I desired above all others. It was from 
the firm of Andrews & Keenan — Warren Andrews and Ro- 
land Keenan — both of whom had been with me as clerks of 
Barrett; had been afterwards set up in business by him, and 
they now, with his approval, proposed employing me. Their 
letter I failed to receive because a boy in the postoffice had 
some weeks previously refused to give me a wafer, remark- 
ing at the time that he kept them for sale, whereupon I 
asked their price, and, being informed, bought a box, 
resolving, as a rebuke for his insolence, that I would not 
patronize his office, even so far as to ask for letters, and 
thereby inflicting on myself greater punishment than I had 
designed for him. And here, if I had time and inclination 
to moralize on the importance of trifles, what sage reflections 
might be uttered on the mysterious fact that a dispute be- 
tween a couple of silly boys about so insignificant a thing as a 
wafer should entirely change and control the destiny of myself 
and my descendants. And on the other hand 

" The best laid schemes o' mice and men 
Gang, aft, agley." 

On arriving in Columbia, instead of lying by privately or 
secretly and ascertaining whether Barrett had the power or 
the disposition to arrest and punish me as a runaway appren- 
tice, which was what I dreaded, I got out of the stage in the 
suburbs and went to the law office of Colonel James Gregg, 
about where Cap Carroll's barber shop is, to consult him as 
to my rights, but he was engaged and never could bear inter- 



22 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



ruptions, so he gave me no satisfaction, and, without more 
ado, I walked down to the stage office, at Dr. Sam Green's 
hotel, opposite the State House, and took a passage for 
Augusta. 

The stage, carrying \.\\q fast mail, took two days and part 
of two nights between Camden and Augusta. The line was 
owned by John McLean of Fayetteville, N. C, who, from 
being a stage driver, became a contractor for carrying the 
mails, and at one time owned, I believe, the entire route from 
Washington to New Orleans. This required a large outlay 
and considerable financial capacity for its successful manage- 
ment. He was assisted by his brothers, Hugh, Daniel and 
Niel, with Gilbert Stalker, a steady old Scotchman, in the 
Columbia office, which became his headquarters and was at 
Adam Edgar's hotel, opposite Dr. McGregor's present drug 
store. McLean must have made large profits by his con- 
tracts. He was the sole owner of the street railroad, worked 
by horse power, from Cotton Town through the middle of 
Main and Bridge streets to the basin on the canal, where 
Alexander Herbemont kept a warehouse for storing goods 
and produce. But, like Judge Gantt's constable, he couldn't 
bear promotion, and began to play the gentleman, a charac- 
ter so happily drawn by Dr. Franklin, who probably had 
more worldly wisdom than any other man our country has 
produced. The Doctor said that soon after going to Eng- 
land he asked his negro servant what he thought of the 
country, and got this answer : " Massa, everybody work here ; 
man work, woman work, child work, horse work, cow work, 
all work but hog; hog walk about and do nothing, Just like 
a gentleman.''^ Carlyle called such a gentleman yrz/^^fi" con- 
sumere iiaii esquire. 

To maintain his character of gentleman, he kept race horses 
and made a match race of four mile heats for $5,000 or 
^10,000 a side with Colonel Crowell, Indian Agent in Georgia, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 23 



to run his horse Duke of Argyle against John Bascom, at 
Augusta. So confident of winning was he, that he went to 
Augusta in a coach and four, taking along a number of car- 
rier pigeons to convey the news of the result to Columbia in 
the least possible time, and when some of his friends who 
had come all the way from Kentucky begged a share in the 
bet he refused. Never was disappointment greater than 
when the race came off, for Argyle was distanced in the first 
heat. His backers charged trickery on the other party, 
asserting that they had obtained access to Argyle's stable the 
night before and bled him nearly to death. However that 
might be, they lost their money and their horse never ran 
another race. 

McLean, in walking up town one morning, accosted Rob- 
ert Waddell at his store, where Agnew now keeps, with the 
question whether he had heard of the good fortune just ex- 
perienced by their mutual friend Colonel Preston, to which 
Waddell replied in the negative. McLean then stated that 
by the death of a relative Colonel Preston had fallen heir to 
a very large estate, and then continued on his way. Waddell 
went home immediately, put on his best suit and betook him- 
self to Colonel Preston's, whom he greeted with his heartiest 
congratulations. Preston asked what he meant, and, being 
told, said: "Mr. Waddell, has it not occurred to you that 
this is the first of April?" Thoroughly disgusted and dis- 
comfited, Waddell went home, resumed his work-day cloth- 
ing, and, returning to the store, armed himself with an axe- 
handle and awaited McLean's reappearance, who called out 
to him at a distance of twenty yards: " Well, Waddell, have 
you found out that this is the first of April?" Waddell 
replied, shaking the stick at him : " It's well for you that you 
got the first word, or I'd have given you a taste of this shil- 
lelah." Hugh McLean delighted in such jokes and in run- 
ning rigs upon his friends. The winter before the great race 



24 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



at Augusta Colonels H. I. Caughman and J. A. Addison of 
Lexington went to the Camden races, where, according to 
Hugh's account, they lost all their money, and, whilst con- 
sulting in the street as to how they should get home, Caugh- 
man saw an Italian with his monkey and organ, who seemed 
to be doing a good business, and suggested to Addison that 
they should join the organ grinder and thus work their way 
back. Addison laughed at the joke, but Caughman took it 
seriously, and swore if Hugh McLean and Sid Johnston 
didn't quit talking about him, somebody would get a d — d 
whipping. When the result of the race at Augusta became 
known, Caughman took his revenge by writing to Hugh that, 
if neces'sary, he would send a negro with a mule and cart to 
bring him back to Columbia. 

As a specimen of Johnston's manner, the following is 
given : He and Caughman were addressing a Miss Kincaid 
in Fairfield, and they both happened to meet and spend a 
night at her house. A few days afterwards a female friend of 
her mother asked the old lady which of the two was the 
favorite. She said she believed Mary liked Mr. Johnston 
best, but for her part she preferred Colonel Caughman, be- 
cause after their departure she had gone* in to both of their 
rooms, and in Johnston's found everything topsy-turvy — a 
pillow in one place, a bolster in another, the bed clothes 
tumbled up, and all about the place in utter confusion. In 
Caughman's, on the contrary, everything was in place — the 
bed neatly made, the room swept and dusted, the water 
emptied, and all just as though nobody had been there, and 
hence she inferred that for a quiet life he was the man. This 
of course was purely an invention of Johnston's. 

In Augusta, I wandered about a couple of days, wheii, 
finding no encouragement, and being nearly out of money, I 
one evening resolved on returning to Columbia afoot and 
running the risk of Barrett's displeasure. The way was long 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 25 



and weary, and the weather cold and inclement. The eve- 
ning before reaching Lexington, on the way back, snow com- 
menced falling and soon covered the ground, making travel 
very uncomfortable in my thin clothes and worn-out shoes. 
I recollect stopping and writing my name in the snow on the 
roadside, thinking that, like it, I would probably soon pass 
away unnoticed and unknown. But, thanks to the " Divinity 
that shapes our ends" and controls all the issues of life, it 
was ordered otherwise, and, after more than sixty years, I 
still survive, though why, or for what purpose, He only 
knows. The next morning, at Lexington, I was received 
hospitably by John Meetze, who never turned the needy away 
empty. We had long been acquainted at Barrett's, where, 
as a country merchant, he bought most of his goods. He 
employed me immediately as a clerk, at ^120 and my board 
for the first year, on the condition that my old master had no 
objection. This we soon found to be the case, and I was at 
last made easy on that score and on all others in the near 
future. It was full time, for my clothes were worn out and I 
had but a half dollar in my pocket, after declining a pressing 
invitation to eat at the house of Colonel Jones, in Edgefield, 
whose wife seemed to suspect the real cause, namely, my 
want of money and unwillingness to make that want known. 
My stay at Lexington was prolonged for seventeen years, 
until January, 1839, when I returned to Columbia and took 
the place of Teller in the Commercial Bank. 

But before giving my recollections of Columbia and Lex- 
ington, I must devote some time to that extraordinary me- 
chanical genius and practical engineer and financier, Henry 
Shultz, whose character and career were too strange and re- 
markable to be passed over without notice in a paper of this 
kind, although it may occupy considerable space. 

On returning from Augusta I passed through Hamburg, 
which Shultz had then just fairly started to build in the midst 



26 KANDOM RECOI.LECTIONS. 



of a hideous swamp, which he had ditched and drained, 
o]:)posite to Augusta, with the view of rivaling that city, by 
intercepting the large quantity of cotton and other produce 
that went there every year from our side of the river. 

Originally from the ancient free city of Hamburg, on the 
Elbe, he had come to Augusta some ten years previously, 
with no capital but his head and his hands. Engaging as a 
day laborer on a pole boat, he soon began to build and run 
his own boats to" and from Savannah. Then he erected the 
Augusta Bridge, on a plan of his own, which stood for fifty 
years or more, uninjured by freshets that swept away others 
constructed by professional architects according to the most 
approved scientific principles. In connection with his part- 
ner, John McKinne, he established the Bridge Bank of 
Augusta, and issued bills that, by their prompt redemption, 
obtained a wide circulation in the Southern States and were 
preferred by many people to all others. His banking house 
stood at the Augusta end of the bridge, on the North side of 
the street leading from it to and across Broad street, and at 
one time he owned a number of other houses on the same 
range. But difficulties arose between him and some of the 
other Augusta banks, and, after a long struggle, in which 
each by turns had the advantage, they managed to present 
more of his bills than he could meet, had them protested, 
sued on, and by a summary process, which he tried to resist, 
levied on, sold and bought in the bridge and all his other 
property in Augusta. He struggled to the last, refusing to 
vacate the premises till dispossessed by main force, under an 
order of the Court, and then resorted to the expedient of 
erecting a toll gate at the other end of the bridge, where he 
exacted payment from all passengers, until prohibited by an 
injunction from the United States Court, after prolonged and 
expensive litigation, in which Judge Butler, of Edgefield, and 
Richard H. Wikle, of Augusta, were opposing counsel. In 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



a fit of desperation, on the day when this injunction was en- 
forced, he attempted to commit suicide by discharging a 
loaded pistol in his mouth, but it happened to range upwards 
and outwards, so that the load came out between his eyes, 
frightfully mutilating him for the time, and leaving indelible 
marks of the powder in his face, yet, strange to say, he re- 
covered, with his eyesight unimpaired. His Hamburg pro- 
ject proved measurably successful ; the town grew and pros- 
pered for several years, enjoying an extensive trade, to the 
serious detriment of Augusta. The Legislature incorporated 
the place, Shultz being Mayor, and chartered the Bank of 
Hamburg, of which Wyatt W. Starke (father of William 
Pinckney Starke, Esq.,) was first President, and Hiram Hutch- 
inson, Cashier. But a fatality, caused apparently by Shultz's 
violent temper, baffled all his efforts. A trunk was stolen 
from a wagon yard in the town, and he, as Mayor, had a 
young man from the country arrested on suspicion of having 
committed the theft. To make him confess, the Mayor or- 
dered him to be severely whipped, in consequence whereof 
he died, and Shultz was indicted for murder, imprisoned 
many months at Edgefield, and narrowly escaped ending his 
turbulent and eventful life on the gallows. I saw him fre- 
quently whilst autocrat of Hamburg, and long after when he 
haunted the halls of the Legislature vainly seeking redress or 
revenge for his losses in Augusta. A tall, erect old man, 
wearing a heavy Waterloo coat that reached his heels, and 
bearing, as it were, the brand of Cain in hi^ forehead. At 
Shultz's death he left a will bequeathing all his right, title 
and interest in the bridge to his friends Jones and Kennedy. 
They employed Carroll & Bacon of Edgefield to look into the 
matter and were advised by their counsel to invoke from the 
Legislature the right of eminent domain on the part of this 
State in one-half of the Savannah River, and to grant them 
the privilege of erecting a toll gate at the South Carolina 



28 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



end of the bridge. This was done, and when the President 
of the bridge company in Augusta threatened to demolish the 
South Carolina toll gate by firing a cannon at it, Jones replied 
that two could play at that game, reminding him that 
Shultz had left a couple of old cannon on the hill in Hamburg, 
which was six hundred feet above Augusta, and that he would 
certainly return the fire. Finally the case was compromised 
by the Augusta owners paying ten thousand dollars to 
Shultz' s heirs under the will. His famous anti-climax toast, 
given when we were trying non-intercourse as a remedy for 
the tariff, was : '•' Freemen's rights and homespun.''^ And this 
reminds me of some other toasts. Mr. Coe, a violent 
''Union man" and member of the Richland Volunteer Rifle 
Company, at a Fourth of July celebration in 1832, gave 
expression to his sentiments by the words: '' Church, State 
and Nullification — three d'nd rascally principles." Where- 
upon the company immediately expelled him by an unanimous 
vote. He afterwards explained his reference to Church and 
State as meaning no objection to either separately, but 
intending to condemn their union. Our game-cock Gov- 
ernor, Stephen D. Miller's celebrated toast was: ''The 
three boxes preservative of liberty — the jury box, the ballot 
box and the cartridge box." He, by the bye, was 
inaugurated as Governor in a full suit of homespun, and when 
speaking earnestly made most awfully ugly faces, as if suffer- 
ing intense torture. Old Billy Jones, at Lexington, gave : 
"Our liberty pole is not straight, but it leans towards General 
Jackson," when old Hickory was a candidate for the Presi- 
dency. And when a great jollification took place in October, 
1832, at Isaac Coleman's theatre and circus, on the corner 
where Mrs. Dial now lives, over the election of the candi- 
dates in favor of Nullification, General James H. Adams and 
Colonel William C. Preston being elected to the House of 
Representatives, the former gave: "The rights of freemen, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



constitutional or not," and the latter, instantly after the 
firing of a rocket, "The State of South Carolina ; may she 
rise like that rocket, not to descend like it in silence and 
darkness, but to remain a fixed star in the firmament." 

From Coleman's the crowd marched with military music to 
greet some of the leading Nullifiers, calling first on Colonel 
James Gregg, who went with us to the College, where old 
Dr. Cooper made a short speech, and then to Colonel J. J. 
Chappell's, on the corner now occupied by the Presbyterian 
printing office. After hearing him, F. C. Barber exclaimed, 
"if the church isn't with us, the chapel is." Finally we 
adjourned to Charley Dukes's saloon, near where Palmer's 
tin shop now is; and at ii o'clock I left Barber and Colonel 
Preston engaged in an encounter of wits, while old Tom 
Baker was singing a smutty song to Colonel Gregg, probably 
the only one of the kind the Colonel ever heard. 



CHAPTER VII. 

COLUMBIA, 1811 TO 1S22. 

Introduction of Steam, with Its Effects — Magnetic Telegraph — 
Express Companies — Water Works, Gas Works and Other Im- 
provements AND Inventions — Changes in Habits, Utensils, Dis- 
eases, &c. — Roads, Streets and Ferries — Drowning of Young 
Blocker— Market and Butchers. 

When I came here in 181 7 the use of steam in moving 
railroad cars, steamboats and machinery for manufacturing 
purposes, with its incalculable effects on trade, travel and 
products, was utterly unknown. We had no telegraph to 
give us before breakfast yesterday's news from all parts of the 
civilized world. The reports of the Liverpool cotton mar- 
ket, for example, were brought by sailing vessels after a voy- 
age of three to six weeks. It was not till 1852 that steam- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



ships began to make regular trips across the ocean, and in 
1858 the first Atlantic cable was successfully laid and operated.''' 
Then no Express Company for a trifling compensation took 
the risk and labor and guaranteed the safe delivery, at our 
very doors, of all packages, regardless of their size, weight 
or value. No water works brought into every house that in- 
dispensable necessity of civilized life. A pump stood at the 
Court House corner on Main street to supply the population 
of the surrounding squares and to fill the firemen's buckets 
in time of a fire. No gas works, kerosene or matches. At 
night candles were kept burning, or flint and steel were 
used to strike a light in case of emergency. 

What an enormous aggregate of toil and capital are in- 
volved in these vast and varied operations, and what an im- 
mense number of people now depend upon them for support ! 

We were without a city clock to give the time by day or 
by night, but a policeman cried the hours at the street cor- 
ners, from bell ring (9 or 10) at night till daylight. No 
telephone enabled us to communicate with distant points by 
word of mouth ; no spectrum analysis told us that other 
planets were composed of like materials with our own; no 
heliograph conveyed messages hundreds of miles by the light 
reflected from a bit of looking glass; and no photographic 
apparatus recorded with unerring certainty the lineaments of 
our faces, our houses or the surrounding scenery. 

Surely the witness or cotemporary of these great and 
numerous novelties and mutations may claim that he has lived 
in an age of progress. 

But these were not all, and I will briefly mention promis- 
cuously such others as occur to me at the moment. 

In the four years of my stay with Barrett, I never saw a 
commercial drummer or book agent. India rubber was used 

*I have a New York newspaper dated January 4th, 1800, with the latest arrival 
from Europe, containing extracts from the London papers of the 20th October, the day 
of the vessel's departure. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 31 



j-(?/<?/y for erasing pencil marks; steel pens were not used at 
all, writing being done with quill pens, and it was quite an 
accomplishment to be able to make them well; we had no 
envelopes — letters were generally on a double sheet, folded 
so as to hide the writing; postage on single letters for long 
distances was twenty-five cents, and prepayment was not re- 
quired ; merchants did not generally deliver goods at the 
houses of their town customers, but required purchasers to 
take them away ; men never wore moustaches, nor carried 
pistols, unless absolutely necessary ; there were no breech- 
loading cannon, repeating rifles or revolving pistols; no per- 
cussion caps. When guns were advertised as firing without 
flint or steel, I could not conceive how it was effected. But 
in nothing has there been a greater change than in the price 
of books. I bought a copy of the first edition of Irving's 
Sketch Book. It was in six numbers, with paper covers like 
our present monthly magazines, but without illustrations, 
and cost seventy-five cents per number, or ^4.50 for the en- 
tire work. Now I can get it unabridged and in better style 
for less than twenty cents. 

Even our diseases and their treatment have greatly changed. 
Fever and ague prevailed all over the State, except, perhsps, 
in the mountains. The ague commonly came on in the fore- 
noon, causing the patient to chatter with cold 'Mn spite of 
his teeth," and, lasting about an hour, was followed by a high 
fever and perspiration, passing off in sleep. It returned near 
the same hour on the first, second or third day, and often 
continued for months. For it the doctors gave calomel and 
jalap, (often producing salivation,) glauber salts, castor oil, 
Peruvian bark and tartar emetic, with copious draughts of 
warm water to induce vomiting. All these I have taken again 
and again. Cold water was absolutely forbidden, even when 
the sufferer was almost dying of thirst. In addition, the lan- 
cet was used freely, and I have seen bleeding afford as sud- 



32 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



den and complete relief in high fever as ever was produced 
on the nerves by hypodermic injection, yet it is now hardly 
ever resorted to. 

Instead of buggies, we drove gigs and sulkies — the seats 
perched high up on two wheels, with shafts held up by tugs. 
These — the shafts or the tugs — were continually breaking and 
throwing the riders under their horses' heels. 

Roads in the country and streets in town were in wretched 
condition. In Columbia a huge mud-hole lay open in front 
of Jimmy Hall's grocery and boarding house on Main street, 
near where Mrs. Robinson's clothing store now is, in which 
old Tom Harvey, the brawny well-digger, earned many a half 
pint by wallowing like a hog in the coldest weather, and it 
was said he would jump into a well for a quart. Jimmy Hall 
had a mill on the canal, which he said ''run like a looseness." 
The street had many ridges and hollows, cut into deep ruts 
in wet weather, there being quite a steep hill between Comer- 
ford's and the corner above, where the postoffice now stands, 
and many a wagon and team stalled and stuck fast on the hill 
beyond Fisher's mill pond, on the road to Granby, where 
the boats landed and all heavy freights were received and 
delivered. No bridge crossed either of the rivers near Co- 
lumbia, and in time of high water the ferries endangered life 
and limb. Once, when a freshet compelled the ferryman to 
let go the rope by which he pulled the flat across the Con- 
garee, the stage, with a full load of passengers, went drifting 
down the river. Young Blocker, a College student from 
Edgefield, who was on his way home, being a good swimmer, 
stripped off his clothes to swim ashore, but it was supposed 
one of the stage horses that had been unharnessed and pushed 
overboard to lighten the load struck him on the back with 
his feet, and he sank to rise no more, till his lifeless body was 
found several miles below. Jack Wey, a dissipated young 
man from Sumter, was on board, and, fearing he would not 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS, 33 



escape, swore he would have one more drink before drown- 
ing, and, suiting the action to the word, pulled out his flask 
and swigged his liquor. In floating down the flat passed 
under a tree on the bank, and, by holding on to a limb till 
help came from the shore, all were saved. 

The Columbia Ferry belonged for many years to Elisha 
Daniel, and was worked by Isom Clark. The market, before 
being built at the Opera House corner, was held under a big 
oak on the South side of Senate street, East of Richardson, 
the principal butchers being old Ben Harrison, George Steel 
and Elisha Hammond. The latter was a tutor and Steward 
of the College — father of James H. Hammond, afterwards 
Governor, — and some years later he moved into the sand 
hills in Lexington with the visionary purpose of making a 
fortune by raising the Pabna Christi or castor oil plant. 

Stump speaking was not practiced outside of Virginia. We 
had no three-pronged silver or plated forks — split spoons, as 
they were first called. Such names as Jenny, Molly, Sally 
and Betty we spelt like very, body and belly, without the 
present termination of ie in place of y. 

No public billiard table was allowed within five miles of 
Columbia. Merchants did not deliver goods at the houses 
of their customers, but purchasers took them away. 

In short, the public and private life of our people was in 
many respects as different as though we had inhabited another 
world. Yet we contrived to live and enjoy ourselves, per- 
haps, as much as people do now. 



34 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

COL UMB I A. —Continued. 

Business Houses on Main Street and Their Occupants— John D. 
Brown and Family— D. & J. J. Faust— Terence, James and John C. 
O'Hanlon — The Bryces — Daniel Morgan — Adam Edgar — Dr. F. 
W. Green — Dr. Percival — John Parr — The Purvises and Hunts — 
Major Hart— Old State House— Isaac Frazier and Isaac H. 
Coleman— Little Levy— R. E. Russell and His Garden. 

Now I shall proceed to give my recollections of the busi- 
ness men, with their locations, on Main street. 

Next below Barrett's, now Stanley's, stood the jail, some 
distance back from the street. It was kept by John D. (Dic- 
tionary) Brown, Deputy Sheriff, a man of strong " contribunc- 
tion," who once made a return that he had taken a defendant 
with a casement, but he had broke customary and was lying 
out in ambition. He had a son, a jack-leg Methodist ex- 
horter, and several daughters, one of whom was the wife of 
Henry McGowan, who still lives here, and another was first 
married to Passmore, a clerk in Hall's shoe store, and after 
his death to Mr. Bauskett of Newberry, a brother of Colonel 
John Bauskett, a well known lawyer and citizen of Columbia, 
and father of the present United States Commissioner. At 
Lexington, on one occasion, the son, who was tongue-tied, 
occupied the pulpit, and I could hardly keep from laughing 
in meeting, when he said, evidently repeating a sentence that 
he had carefully memorized as sure to bring down the 
house : ''Then you will thee the tharthe thinking from their 
thilver thocketth while Gabriel ith preaching hith latht 
funeral thermon to the thun." At Cantwell's corner, Daniel 
M. & John J. Faust, State Printers, published the Weekly 
State Gazette for many years — the only newspaper in the 
place. Their office on the ground floor opening to the 
street, with its old-time lever press worked by hand, was the 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 35 



admiration of many visitors from the country. The senior 
partner, Daniel Faust, an exemplary member of the Metho- 
dist Church, had six children, three sons and three daugh- 
ters — John M., a gambler and "ne'er do well;" Edwin, a 
physician, died young; and Clem, who married a daughter 
of Dr. Bratton, of Winnsboro, and soon sent her home 
because they disagreed; Susan, a great beauty, became the 
wife of Wm. Brickell, a young lawyer; Jane died at an 
early age of consumption, and Mary, married to Dr. Pierce 
of Alabama, is still alive. The daughters claimed that their 
father was not a mechanic but an artist. General John J. 
Faust lived on the North side of Boundary street. West of 
Main, where he had rope works during the war. The office 
was afterwards turned into a shoe store and kept by Hall & 
Co., Yankees, who dealt in good stock and got high prices. 
They were succeeded by G. M. Thompson, who carried on 
the business successfully and sold out to Mitchell & Hood. 

Mr. Thompson, when an old bachelor, married Mrs. Ann 
Sims, whose first husband, a printer, had deserted her and 
gone West. Thompson died, I believe, during the war, 
leaving a handsome property, wjiich was much reduced sub- 
sequently. M. A. Shelton, a nephew of Thompson, came 
here from Connecticut and married Mrs. Thompson's daugh- 
ter by Sims, and his widow survived till a year or two ago. 
The Sheltons, her descendants, are still with us. 

Just below the printing office, Terence O'Hanlon, (Old 
Terrible,) a burly Irishman, kept a dirty little grocery and 
owned a huge blunderbuss, which he always fired ®ff at 
Christmas and Fourth of July, and would have used on the 
mischievous youths who hung a stuffed Paddy on his door on 
St. Patrick's day in the morning if he could have discovered 
who they were. His brother, who.se name I have forgotten, 
had two sons, James and John C, and three daughters, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Hannah, the wife of Dr. Jones, Catharine, married to 
Sweeny the printer, and Ann, who rather late in life became 
the wife of a shoemaker named Smith. 

Major James O'Hanlon of Log Castle, after serving an 
apprenticeship to the saddler's trade in Philadelphia, re- 
turned to Columbia, studied and practiced law, was always a 
consistent and enthusiastic Jackson man, became a member 
of the Legislature and married a daughter of Colonel David 
Myers, who gave him a valuable plantation and a number of 
negroes. He delivered a Fourth of July oration at Lexing- 
ton, the best part of which was taken, without acknowledg- 
ment, from one by Robert Y. Hayne. Whilst he was a 
member of the House, Wm. E. Martin, Clerk of the Senate, 
gave Baskins, the Messenger, 3. note from Pemberton, State 
Printer, telling him to deliver it to the ugliest man in the 
Representative Hall, and Baskins, after looking about, pre- 
sented it to O'Hanlon, who said it was not for him, but Bas- 
kins insisted that, from the description, he must be the man. 
John C. O'Hanlon, a noted gambler, married a Miss Ham- 
ner, sister of Mrs. A. M. Hunt. At one time, while rich, 
he built a fine brick hotel, just North of the present Colum- 
bia Hotel. 

While serving on the jury in Columbia the Major got into 
a dispute with Judge James, and afterwards procured the 
impeachment of His Honor for drunkenness on the bench, 
which, I think, resulted in his conviction and dismissal from 
office. 

John Bryce, a bright, brisk little Scotchman, had a 12 by 
15 shoe shop next below Terence O'Hanlon, where he made 
my first pair of shoes after my arrival, which, bye the bye, 
were too small and pinched my toes most painfully. By 
untiring energy and keen intelligence he amassed a large for- 
tune and became a leader in many useful enterprises, being one 
of the founders and Directors of the Commercial Bank of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 37 



Columbia, the original projector and first President of our Gas 
Light Company and a large stockholder in the Congaree and 
Broad River Bridge Companies. He, his brother Robert and 
his sister Jane were devoted members of the Methodist 
Church, and his other sister married James Young, the owner 
of Young's Mill. Robert Bryce presided over the first Sun- 
day school in Columbia, assisted by Miss Johnson, a daugh- 
ter of Rev, Wm. B. Johnson of the Baptist Church, and Mrs. 
Peck, a Presbyterian, I believe, who still survives. She was 
the wife of Mr. Peck, a merchant tailor, and daughter of Dr. 
Thomas Parks, Professor in the South Carolina College. John 
Dunlap and I went to this Sunday school several months. 

Next below was Colonel James Gregg's law office, and then, 
came Daniel Morgan's brick store and dwelling with slate 
roof, claiming to be fireproof; his dry goods occupying the 
Northern end and the book store of Morgan & Guirey that at 
the South, with a passage between them leading to apartments 
above. James L. Clark, known long after as an officer in the 
Branch Bank, was one of Mr. Morgan's clerks. After failing 
in business, Mr. Morgan retired to the sand hills in Lexing- 
ton, near Granby, where he had, married into the Arthur fam- 
ily, and passed the rest of his days in deer hunting, mostly 
on foot. In this active and peaceful pursuit he lived to a 
good old age, apparently never regretting the loss of his 
fortune. 

Adam Edgar's tavern and tailor shop were at the corner 
below, where, with the help of his wife Fanny, by strict 
economy and constant vigilance, he accumulated a large 
estate. A blustering Scotchman and devout Methodist, he 
used to say he 'Miked a preacher that hammered the rust off 
the sinners." His old mother he brought over from Scot- 
land, and it was said she sat on his front steps and asked 
every passing negro if he belonged to "Audam." Having 
no children, he provided handsomely for his wife, and left 



38 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



the rest of his property to the family of his relative, George 
Shiell, saying, when advised to secure it from being wasted 
by them, that if they did so it would be all right. Shiell was 
the man that proposed, when a subscription had fallen short 
in the Presbyterian Church, that each subscriber should 
double his amount, and being asked what he had subscribed 
replied twenty-five cents. 

Edgar's Inn changed owners often after his death, falling 
by turns into the hands of Mr. , of Charleston ; Col- 
onel Wm. Maybin, of Newberry, with Colonel A. H. Glad- 
den, of Fairfield, who, as General, was killed at Shiloh in 
1863; J. C. Janney, Dr. T. J. Goodwyn and Wm. Glaze, 
as partners, and of Janney & Leaphart, till the memorable 
night of February 15th, 1865, when Columbia was laid in 
ashes by Sherman's men, of which event I hope to give an 
account in the sequel. 

At the corner across Lady street was then, or soon after, a 
drug store owned by Dr. Sam Green and kept by Dr. F. W. 
Green, recently deceased, and still later by Dr. Samuel Per- 
cival. Dr. F. W. Green's wife was a daughter of Wm. 
Briggs, the builder of the Columbia Bridge, and her sister 
was first married to Hugh McLean and afterwards to Henry 
Davis. Dr. Green built the Red Bank Cotton Factory in 
Lexington, which is in successful operation and gives em- 
ployment to forty or fifty hands. He left a large family, his 
sons all seeming to have inherited a turn for mechanical busi- 
ness. Dr. Percival owned mills in Richland sand hills, and 
also left a large number of children, among them our present 
County Auditor, who, when quite a youth, was a Mexican 
volunteer. 

This store afterwards belonged to Isaac Lyons, father of 
Henry and Jacob C, who kept it as a grocery. Captain 
Henry Lyons once told me that his grandfather had been 
burnt alive in Lisbon on account of his religion. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 39 



Lower down on the same square were John Parr's furni- 
ture shop and store and the dry goods establishments of 
Thomas Arthur, John J. Say lor — who afterwards moved to 
Sandy Run, in Lexington, — and Latta & Walter, the last 
being continued across the street just below Hunt's Hotel. 
Mr. Parr built a fine brick dwelling on the Northeast corner 
of Plain and Sumter streets, which was afterwards owned by 
John Waring, Dr. H. H. Toland, J. Duncan Allen and Dr. 
R. W. Gibbes till burnt by General Sherman. 

The Purvises, Scotch merchants, who left here about the 
time I came, kept one of the largest groceries on the corner 
of Main and Gervais streets, now occupied by R. M. Ander- 
son, afterwards known as Lyons's. The Hunts, two or three 
in number, succeeded the Purvises, and one of them mar- 
ried a daughter of old Dr. Hughes, who lived on the West 
side of Main street, above Ainsley Hall's corner. 

Across Gervais street, at the corner of the State House lot, 
dwelt Gersham Chapman, successor of Dr. Sam Green as 
Postmaster, in a dwelling afterwards kept as a boarding house 
by Major Benjamin Hart. In an election for Intendant 
Major Hart and Bernard Reilly received a tie vote, and when 
it was tried over the Major was elected by a majority of two. 
This election turned somewhat on the question of wet or dpy, 
Reilly being a retailer, while Hart was a strict Methodist and 
temperance man. The latter lived in Lexington at one time, 
was Senator from that District and owned Kennerly's or 
Hart's Ferry on Saluda, his wife being a widow Herron, a 
member of the Bell family of Granby. His daughter, 
Claudia, married ''Dot" Means, of Fairfield, and Miss Mary 
became the wife of Colonel Robert Preston, of Virginia. 

The old State House, built of wood, stood near the South- 
ern end of the square, a little West of Main street, facing 
East, with a portico in front, reached by a broad flight of 
steps on each side, beneath which was the entrance to the 



40 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



State executive offices and the Branch Bank on the Southwest 
corner. Abov^ stairs the House occupied the Northern and 
the Senate the Southern end, separated by a broad passage or 
lobby, which was crossed by another leading from front to 
rear, the spaces between them forming t:ommittee rooms. 
When B. F. Hunt, a member of the House from Charleston, 
succeeded in passing an appropriation for the building of a 
new State House, Charles McCullough, stonemason, con- 
tracted to lay the foundation on the site of the old house, 
which, notwithstanding its size, was easily removed by the 
use of a capstan and a horse or two. After the walls had got 
some feet above ground, they were found to be so defective 
that they were taken down and rebuilt across Main street 
where the building now stands. 

On the corner below was located the tavern afterwards 
known as Wm. G. Huntt's, to which Isaac Frazier removed 
from Bryce's stand, corner of Main and Blanding streets. 
Frazier was a regular gambler, and John W. Clark, who 
aspired to the position of a public censor, once prevailed on 
him to swear that he had seen James Boatwright, Judah Bar- 
rett and other respectable citizens playing cards for money. 
On this Clark expected to found an indictment against them 
for gambling. But Frazier was better known to Barrett than 
to Clark, and before the Court met he made oath that his 
former affidavit was a mistake and the parties implicated were 
innocent of the charge. Isaac H. Coleman, who married 
Frazier's only daughter, Maria, was a great fop, and I have 
seen him decked in the height of the fashion then prevail- 
ing — a bottle-green cassimere coatee, buff Marseilles vest and 
loose pantaloons of the finest white linen, with a ruffled shirt, 
a bell-crowned black beaver hat, and around his neck a black 
Barcelona silk handkerchief showing a double bow knot in 
front, while on his feet were white silk socks and low-quar- 
tered pumps. Many years afterwards, being suspected, on 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 41 



apparently good grounds, of giving free papers to negroes 
that absconded from Columbia to the North, he was notified 
by Colonel R. H. Goodwin and some other leading citizens 
to leave the place within a week, on pain of what might fol- 
low, and refused peremptorily, but on reflection concluded to 
comply, and disappeared till after the war, when he came 
back and lived among us to the end of his days. 

Below the State House several retailers did a considerable 
business. Among them was "little Levy," a conceited and 
diminutive specimen of the Hebrew race, so great an admirer 
of Colonel Preston that he made him his heir, and when on 
the jury refused to decide against his clients, arguing that no 
one had ever caught Preston in a lie or known him to com- 
mit a mean act. 

Opposite the State House Robert E. Russell, formerly a 
tailor, had, somewhat later, a flower garden of an acre in 
extent, where he received a handsome income from the sale of 
roses and other plants. He lived at the Northwest corner of 
Washington and Assembly streets, in the previous residence 
of John Glover, and had married Martha Taylor, a beautiful 
and notorious woman, who deserted him for Durang, a 
dancer in Young's Theatre, and some years later stabbed to 
death another prostitute, for which crime she suff'ered a long 
imprisonment, but finally escaped a conviction for murder. 



42 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER IX. 

COL UMBIA.—Contimied. 

Main Strt^st, E vst Side— Dk. Sam Green— Business Men and Tueir 
Houses from Gervais to Lady Street — From Lady to Washington — 
From Washinotpn to Plain, Including the Court House— From 
Plain to Camden or Taylor Street — From Taylor to Blanding — 
From Blanding to Laurel. 

Next North of Russell's garden was the tavern of Dr. 
Sam Green, Postmaster, and for several terms Intendant of 
the town, who had the habit of exclaiming "Ah!" when- 
ever addressed. He presided at a public meeting on the 
death of ex-President Monroe, and when Colonel Gregg, 
rising to present the resolutions, said, in his blunt way, 
"Mr. Chairman, Mr. Monroe's dead," the Doctor responded 
with a prolonged "Ah !" that excited the merriment of the 
crowd and added nothing to the gravity of the occasion. 

The postoffice was in a little wooden building just Nortli 
of the hotel. Across Gervais street John Rabb kept a tavern 
at the corner where Barney Reilly afterwards did a prosper- 
ous business in the grocery line. About midway of the 
square Peter McGuire, an Irishman, made large gains by 
boarding and selling liquor to his countrymen who worked 
on the canal. On Lady street, near to Main, was a public 
house owned by Colonel Clairborne Clifton, a club-footed 
lawyer and Methodist preacher, and kept by Chestine E. 
Williamson, whose wife had been the widow of Dr. Hendrix, 
and after Williamson's death married Wm. Hilligas, who 
soon died, and she then continued the business there, as also 
at a later period in John O'Hanlon's new hotel and at the 
corner now kept by Mrs. Wright. Colonel Tom Campbell and 
McNary succeeded Mrs. Hilligas at the corner long after 
known as Hunt's Hotel, which was carried on for some time 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



by Dr. Thomas Briggs and then by A. M. Hunt. When 
burnt by Sherman's army in 1865, it was in possession of T. 
S. Nickerson, who soon after opened in the Female College 
building. 

Crossing Lady street, we find on the North a boarding 
house by James Cammer from Charleston, which afterwards 
passed into the hands of George Shiell, and still later was 
kept as a confectionery and cigar store by Captain Henry 
Beard. Near the middle of the square was a range of 
mechanics' shops, reaching almost to the corner of Washing- 
ton street, viz., John Glover's, coachmaking; Middleton 
Glaze's, blacksmith ; and James Boatwright's, cotton gins, 
where the latter toiled unceasingly at his trade till it made 
him one of the richest men in the place, his gins being in 
great demand, without competition, as far South and West as 
Louisiana. Where his shops then stood Sidney Crane after- 
wards carried on a grocery, and just below Wm. Hillery was 
engaged in the same business. At the corner adjoining his 
shops Dr. Augustus Fitch dealt in drugs and medicines. 
His residence was on the present court house corner, where 
he reared a numerous family, and, though quite illiterate, 
spent a long and useful life, universally beloved and respected 
for his correct principles, sound judgment, simple manners, 
and generous, benevolent disposition, which was often im- 
posed on to his great loss. Four of his daughters were mar- 
ried, respectively, to Thomas Hutchinson, James Fleming, 
Eli Kennerly and James D. Tradewell, whose habits he dis- 
approved of, and he used to say the Devil owed him a grudge 
and paid him in sons-in-law. Burwell, his oldest son, married 
a Miss Watson, and moved to Edgefield, where he still lives. 
The widow of James Sampson, his second son, a sister of Dr. 
C. H. Miot, is also still living. And among the many ladies 
in Columbia who nursed and waited on our suffering soldiers 
in the war, I have heard Mrs. Sampson Boatwright and Mrs. 



44 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Drusy Rawls, wife of Dr. Thomas Rawls, mentioned as par- 
ticularly active and efficient. Dr. John H. Boatwright, the 
third son, had for his wife Miss Mary Freeman, who, after 
his death, removed to Wilmington, N. C. Her mother was 
married to F. A. Tradewell, who, since her death, went to 
Sumter, where he still resides. Mr. Boatwright and John 
Glover married sisters of the Faust family, above Columbia. 
Glover left Columbia for a place some three miles above, 
where he kept a public house for many years. The court 
house stood at the Northeast corner of Main and Washing- 
ton streets, on a lot that extended to where McKenzie's con- 
fectionery is now. There it joined to "Uncle Sammy Her- 
ring's" grocery and hardware establishment, which, when he 
moved to Boundary street, was continued with great success 
by his nephew David Ewart, a little, crooked, energetic and 
well informed Irishman. Unfortunately, in his old age, he 
got to dabbling in cotton, and, with his positive, dogmatic 
temperament, assumed to know more about the state of the 
market, both at home and abroad, than any one else. As in 
the case of others holding such opinions, he backed his judg- 
ment, and that to an extent that, when his calculations failed, 
cost him all that he was worth and much more. Besides this, 
a fire, commencing in his back store, burnt up his goods and 
buildings, with nearly half the rest of the square. He had 
erected a hotel adjoining the court house lot, which was 
tenanted successively by John W. Clark, before he opened 
at the sign of the Horse on Blanding and Main streets, and 
by James Rush, a brother-in-law of Richard and Thomas 
O'Neale. 

Mr. Ewart and Colonel Blanding erected the Saluda 
Factory, the first large establishment of the kind in the 
State. It has since changed hands many times, being first 
sold at a very heavy loss to the Fishers, Edward H. and 
John, who had been operating a small affair of the kind at 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 45 



what is now known as Dent's Mill; and afterwards to Dr. R. 
W. Gibbes, when it was managed by his son, James G. 
Gibbes, who is still among us. North of Evvart's was the 
millinery shop of Turner Bynum and wife, who had several 
children — one, bearing his father's name, soon after graduat- 
ing in college, became an editor at Greenville and was killed 
in a duel by Major (since Governor) B. F. Perry. Alfred, 
another son, set out with fair prospects as a lawyer in Colum- 
bia, but became dissipated, went West and was killed at the 
Alamo. Of Bynum's daughters, one was married to I. C. 
Morgan, the printer, and another to John G. Bowman, at 
one time editor of the Temperance Advocate ; and his widow 
in her old age was Matron of the Orphan House on Wash- 
ington street. Next to Bynum's was ''the cheapest store 
under the sun," kept by a Jew whose name I have forgotten, 
and then came the dry goods store of "Black-eyed Billy 
Taylor," whose residence was on the corner. Mr. T., a rela- 
tive of the old patriarchal family of that name, subsequently 
moved to Lexington, near Piatt Springs, on Congaree Creek. 
One of his daughters married Isaac H. Smith, an old class- 
mate of mine in Camden, who taught school both at Lexing- 
ton and in Columbia; another, the wife of P. G. McGregor, 
is still living here; and still another, married to Jacob Bell, 
was the mother of Mrs. C. H. Miot. 

Dr. B. F. Harris, a learned, eccentric and snappish little 
Englishman, had a drug store on' the site now occupied by 
the Central National Bank, and built a brick theatre at the 
Northwest corner of Plain and Assembly streets. He tried 
to increase his income by issuing change bills as proprietor 
of the theatre, but they obtained only a very limited circula- 
tion. His stand was kept for a while as a clothing and dry 
goods store by R. A. Taylor, whose initials caused some fun, 
as also did those of B. D. & T. H. Plant, booksellers, at R. 
L. Bryan's place of business ; they being interpreted as Be 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



D/n/ a.nd Toiichhole Plant. The next, door neighbors of Dr. 
Harris at that time I have fprgotten, but some years later 
Levi Sherman and Levi Hawley, saddles and harness; Harvey 
Davis, carriages, &c., and T. S. Dickinson, who was suc- 
ceeded by Stevenson «Sz: Walker, merchant tailors, all made 
considerable fortunes in their respective callings. 

The millinery and general stock of John Black and his 
wife Margaret was near where Dr. Fisher's drug store is now. 
Mr. and Mrs. Black were both Irish and Methodists. His favor- 
ite saying was "ought from ought leaves nothing, but, if any- 
thing, you owe me a half bushel of corn." She had a shrewd 
turn for business and a very sharp tongue for those who dis- 
pleased her. Their daughter Jane, a gay, dashing young 
lady, married Wm. Cline, a Northern man and editor of 
more than one newspaper at different times. Her brother, 
Alex. Brodie, was noted for his prowess as a bruiser, of great 
muscular strength and rather quarrelsome disposition, who 
would fight for fair play and always took the side of the weaker 
party. Once, while living in Granby, he invited a few 
friends to go with him some miles below and see him 70/iop 
a fellow who had crossed him. The fellow refused to fight 
till Brodie, in his eagerness for the combat and his confi- 
dence of victory, offered and actually paid him five dollars 
for the satisfaction of beating him, and then, to his great dis- 
appointment, got the worst whipping he ever had in his life. 
In a quarrel with a circus man over a dog fight he said 
"Dash can whop your lion, and Dash's mammy can whop 
your hyenia, and iil' n you I can whop you." To a young 
man who said that his gray hairs protected him, he replied : 
"My gray hairs are not in your way." His wife was of a 
German family in Lexington, and he used to say that the 
Irish and the Dutch made a "dom'd bad assoartment." When 
asked by some temperance men to join their society, he 
declined, but advised them to try Mrs. B., and she, in turn, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 47 



when applied to, refused, and recommended that they go to 
Aleck. Mr. Peter Bryce, on being urged to sign the pledge, 
declared that if he were to do so there would be no rest for 
him till he had gone off and got drunk. John I. Walter, a 
Philadelphian, kept a hardware store next below Mr. Black's 
and married Sarah Nutting, by whom he had one son, Wm. 
T., whose widow, Mrs. M. C. Walter, still survives. About 
this time Richard Sondley, from Newberry, commenced busi- 
ness near the present site of Duffie's book store. He was 
one of the few speculators in cotton that made money and 
kept it. His profits one year were thirty thousand dollars, 
but he lost nearly as much the next season. His first wife 
was Miss Slappy, of Savanahunt, in Lexington, and his 
second a widow of the Alexander family on French Broad 
River, North of Asheville, N. C. 

Above Sondley, Miller & Poole had a shoe store. Thos. 
Porter Miller, son of the former, is a banker and broker of 
many years' standing in Mobile, Alabama. 

At the Southeast corner of Main and Camden streets Zebu- 
Ion Rudolph kept a fine stock of dry goods. One of his 
daughters, while quite young, married Colonel Austin F. 
Peay of Fairfield, a widower much her senior, but they soon 
soon separated. 

Across Camden street Wm. Monteith, from Scotland, had 
a tavern and tailor shop. His son, Galloway, father of W. 
S. and Ainsley Monteith, served an apprenticeship with 
Ainsley Hall, and late in life was employed and taken care of 
by James Martin, cotton buyer. 

Next to Monteith's was Samuel Pearse's tin shop, kept 
a while with S. Pilsbury, which he afterwards moved higher up 
on the same square. Dr. Edward Sill, a perfect model of 
industry and attention to business, kept a drug store where 
Dr. Heinitsh's is now. He once told me that he had not 
lost a day from business in twenty years. After getting rich, 



48 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



he bought the entire range from the court house lot to the 
corner above, but the habit of drinking overcame him, and 
his hard earnings nearly all slipped through his hands. Never 
idle, however, he tried the auction and commission business 
for awhile and was the publisher of the first daily paper in 
Columbia, a small sheet at its birth, that somehow never grew 
or prospered. After being burnt out by Sherman's army in 
1865, he removed to Charlotte or Salisbury, N. C, where he 
died. At the corner above stood the large store and dwell- 
ing of Colonel John M. Creyon, an Irish gentleman of good 
education and polished manners. The building was after- 
wards converted into a hotel by John W. Clark, who erected 
the pillar on which stood the famous bronze horse as a sign. 
After Clark's time it became the property of James Boat- 
wright and was kept by his daughter, Mrs. Sarah Fleming, 
and her son, James T. Fleming. At the celebration of Wash- 
ington's birthday in 18 — a party of young men were carous- 
ing there till near daylight, and on leaving the house ran 
over old Mr. Boatwright, who was an early riser, on the pave- 
ment, dislocating the bones of his hip joint and making him 
a cripple for life. He knew the parties, but refused to tell 
their names, saying it was merely accidental and he wished 
no ill feeling towards them from any of his family. The 
hotel then fell into the hands of the Catholic Church, where 
they had a nunnery and female seminary till Sherman's van- 
dals burnt it. "^i 

Across Blahding street was the shop of John Neuffer, a 
German butcher, who, like almost everyone then in business, 
made money. He started a tan yard on the Garner's Ferry 
road, between Columbia and the race track. He professed 
to be satisfied with one per cent, profit on his business, and 
said that if he bought an article for one dollar and sold it for 
two he had made one per cent, by the transaction. His 
stand was afterwards occupied as a dry goods store by John 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 49 



F. Marshall, a sort of irregular Baptist preacher, one of whose 
sons, Edward W., became a leading Charleston merchant in 
the same line, and another, Lawrence R., still lives here. 
Immediately above, Sammy Lopez, a quizzical, cock-eyed 
little Jew, a fine performer on the violin, kept a clothing store 
some years later. His weak points were vanity and credulity, 
which were played upon by some wags persuading him that 
he could be elected Mayor in preference to Captain Lyons 
and inducing him to spend a good deal of time in election- 
eering. Again, one ist of April he was told that certain 
ladies from the country at O'Neale's, in Cotton Town, 
wanted some old-fashioned bonnets, with which he was over- 
stocked, whereupon he donned hfs bell- crowned beaver and 
claw-hammer-tailed coat, and, with a load of the bonnets 
under each arm, betook himself to O'Neale's, "where, being 
informed that the ladies had just gone to a neighboring store, 
he pursued a fool's errand from place to place, till some one 
cried out, ''April fool." 

''Old Willy Barclay," as he was called, an honest, simple- 
minded Scotch Presbyterian, kept a retail store in the build- 
ing now occupied by Mr. Stenhous'e, who married his daughter 
Janet. He once made an assignment, and, on selling out his 
stock, was found to be perfectly solvent. The same thing, 
with like result, was done by his kinsman, Robert Bryce, 
since the war. He was a decided and rather noisy advocate 
of temperance, and Dr. Crane, the phrenologist, who prob- 
ably knew the fact, disgusted him greatly by declaring, on a 
public examination of his head, that he was a very clever fel- 
low, but too fond of the bottle. His son William was a por- 
trait painter and died at an early age. Bowling & Co., an 
Irish firm of cotton merchants, from Charleston, were next 
above Barclay's. 



50 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 

CHAPTER X. 

COL UMB I A. —Continued. 

West Side of Main Street — Ainsley Hall — Andrew Wallace — 
Columbia Insurance Company — David Coulter — Nott & McCord — 
Shipwreck — Wm. L. Lewis. 

Where the postoffice now stands Ainsley Hall built a large 
store and dwelling and carried on the most extensive business 
in cotton and general merchandise in the town. He had 
been brought from the old country by the Purvises, and after 
serving them some years as a clerk struck out on his own 
account. Being a clear-headed and fearless speculator, at the 
close of the war, and afterwards, he became immensely rich. 
Of medium stature, but elegantly formed, with the finest com- 
plexion I have ever seen, and always neatly dressed, he was a 
perfect pattern of a gentlemanly English merchant of the 
olden time. His wife, Miss Hopkins, belonged to one of 
the aristocratic families in Richland Fork, and the connec- 
tion secured him the custom and patronage of that wealthy 
region ; but they had no children. The residence adjoining 
his store was expensively furnished and fitted up, and he im- 
ported from England the most superb carriage that was then 
in the State. I have understood that when the war of 1812 
closed he had a conditional contract with General Wade 
Hampton for the purchase of the latter' s two or three crops 
of cotton — several hundred bales — at a stipulated price, pro- 
vided he signified his confirmation of the bargain to Kirk- 
patrick & Co., their mutual factors in Charleston, before it 
was rescinded by Hampton's order. The news of peace was 
received by both parties in Columbia about the same time, 
and, as it was known that the price of the staple would im- 
mediately advance three or four fold, each was anxious — the 
one to confirm and the other to nullify the agreement. Hall 
hastened to mount George Cotchett, an active little Scotch- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 51 



man in his employ, on a fleet horse to close the contract with 
Kirkpatrick, while Hampton sent a trusty negro on one of 
his best racers with a note to revoke it. Cotchett reached 
Charleston first, and had just completed the arrangements 
with Kirkpatrick when Hampton's servant entered the office 
bearing orders to annul it. By this deal in futures, Hall was 
said to have cleared several hundred thousand dollars, but 
such amounts are generally exaggerated. He brought James 
Macfie and John Mclver from Scotland at the same time as 
clerks, and his brother, Wm. A. Hall, a one-eyed man, who 
was father of George A. Hall, came over still later and be- 
came a partner in the house. 

Being a foreigner and devoted to his business, he took no 
interest in military matters, and was fined for repeated fail- 
ures to muster in the militia. According to law the fine was 
some trifling sum, with the addition of fifty per cent, on 
defaulter's State tax, which in his case amounted to about 
fifteen hundred dollars. This he failed to pay, and, by order 
of Captain D. L. Wakely, who worked in Edgar's tailor shop, 
his wagon and team were levied upon in the street and driven 
into Edgar's yard for safe-keepin'g. When the wagoner re- 
ported to Hall what had taken place, he proceeded to Edgar's 
with a walking cane in his hand, followed by the wagoner 
with an axe. At the gate he found Edgar armed with a big 
horse pistol guarding the way and forbidding entrance, but 
by Hall's command the wagoner broke open the gate with 
the axe, and he, with stick uplifted, charged upon Edgar, 
who retreated, pistol in hand, crying out, "Stand back, Hal !" 
Thus he recovered his property and the Courts were called 
upon to decide the matter, with what result I have forgotten. 
For him the Preston mansion was originally erected by Yates 
& Philips, carpenters and contractors. It was subsequently 
sold to General Hampton, who enlarged and improved it. 



52 KAN DOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



At Comerford's corner, Jacob Longinotti, a dirty, drunken 
little Italian, sold fruit and candy. He once had his wrist 
dislocated, and when asked by Aleck Brodie, ''What ails 
your arm?" answered, '' Dees lo kat." I don't want to look 
at it, ''said the other, but what's the matter with it?" 
"Dees lo kat it," repeated Longy. "I don't want to look 
at it; I'm no doctor," said Brodie impatiently, "but how 
did you break it?" "Dees lo kat it," again replied Longy, 
elevating the injured member as if for inspection. Brodie 
could stand no more, and with an angry exclamation of "I 
wish it was your neck that was broke instead of your arm," 
walked off, leaving the Italian gazing after him in mute amaze- 
ment. 

At Bryce's corner (Peter and Robert Bryce; late Hen- 
drixes) Isaac Frazier, who afterwards moved to Huntt's be- 
low the State House, had a tavern, and in rear of it was quite 
a steep hill, overlooking the Park grounds, on which stood 
the dwelling of Mr. Stanley, father of our respected fellow 
citizen Wm. B. Stanley, President of the Central National 
Bank. A few doors below, old Mr. Kennard, a great political 
controversialist, did a small business in grain. A little lower 
down was Jemmy Hall's low boarding and drinking house. 
The next corner — now Diercks's — was occupied by old Mr. 
McDowell, a man of large size and strong passions, who had 
a wooden leg, and when, in his old age, he married a young 
woman, some mischievous wag sent him a caricature entitled 
"A chip of the old block," representing an infant on its back 
in a cradle, sticking out a perfect miniature of the old man's 
wooden leg. He threatened to drive his fist through the fel- 
low that sent it if he could find him out. 

At or next above McDowell's was old Dr. Smith, a very 
stout, fat man, who had two sons, John and James, and a 
daughter, Grace, who married Arba Sterns and removed to 
one of the Western States. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 53 



Near the site of the Ice House lived Joseph Smith, a car- 
penter, whose daughter was first married to Wm. Hitchcock 
and afterwards to Robert Swaffield, whom she survives. 

The first store at Dial's corner was that of Watts & Kins- 
ler — Wm. B. W^atts, who quit Barrett's when I went in, and 
Colonel Jeremiah Kinsler of the Camp Ground neighborhood. 
Theirs was a grocery and cotton business, and at Kinsler's 
death, Allen Gibson, of Fairfield, took his place in the firm, 
which was then called Watts & Gibson. Watts, a sharp, 
active business man, married a daughter of Manoel Antonio 
and removed to the Fork, below Columbia, where, while 
drunk, he killed a man and was tried for murder, but ac- 
quitted. Gibson went to Florida. Just below the corner 
was a store kept first by Jacob Ottolengui, an auctioneer, then 
by Isaac Davega, of Charleston, for dry goods, and after- 
wards for clothing and groceries by Solomon Davis, a Jew, 
famous for the quantity of food he consumed. Next was 
Manoel Antonio's brick store and dwelling. He was a 
Spaniard, from Cuba, of good education, who had several 
very pretty daughters. One of the walls of his house was 
cracked by the earthquake in i8ji, as was also that of one of 
the College buildings. The vacant lot next to Antonio was 
afterwards filled by the hotel which John O'Hanlon built. 
The baker shop of George Nutting and millinery store of his 
wife, Mary — parents of Mrs. John I. Walter and Mrs. M. W. 
Stratton — were towards the Southern end of the present 
Colum.bia Hotel. The two stores next below were occupied 
at a later period by Roland Keenan (old Rory Bean) and 
Henry Moss, the former keeping a general stock and the 
other clothing. Keenan had a prodigious nose and a thin, 
whining voice, and he stopped every country wagon in the 
street with the question, " What have you got to sell?" This 
greatly annoyed and irritated Moss, who procured an enor- 
mous pasteboard nose, and, fastening it over his own, would 



54 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



sally into the street and mimick Keenan's whine, with the 
same question, to the great amusement of their neighbors. 
One day when Moss was in the height of his fun, it suddenly 
came to an end by Keenan's assaulting him with a heavy 
wagon whip so severely that he was laid up for two or three 
we'eks. Dr. Samuel Jones had a private boarding house next 
below. His wife was a sister of Major O'Hanlon, and her 
descendants inherited the Major's property, he having died 
leaving no wife or children. To carry out a strange crotchet, 
Dr. Jones built an adobe house, with clay walls, in the North- 
eastern section of the town, which stood till washed down by 
the rain. Below Dr. Jones's was the saddlery and harness 
shop of Needham Davis, who sold out and went to live on 
Edisto River, in Orangeburg. At the corner (now Agnew's) 
Wallace & Macfie kept a large dry goods, grocery and cotton 
house. Both were perfect types of the canny, cautious, 
clear-headed, painstaking, honest and thrifty Scot, who does 
well wherever he may be placed. Mr. Wallace was unusually 
systematic, intelligent, industrious and economical, accord- 
ing to his son John, saving shoe leather by always seeking a 
soft place to put down his foot. Leaving Scotland at an 
early age, on the deliberate conclusion that it was no place 
for one to rise in the world without capital or influential 
friends, he landed in Charleston and came to Columbia with 
Colonel Taylor's wagons. Having been well trained as a 
merchant, he amassed a large fortune in a few years and mar- 
ried a Miss Patrick, step daughter of John McLemore, a 
wealthy planter in Richland Fork. In accordance with his 
character for prudence and foresight, he determined to retire 
from business on attaining what he regarded as a competency 
and to run no risk of losing what he had earned. This was 
before I came to Columbia. And he joined Macfie because 
the latter needed capital and had the energy and capacity 
that insured success. But finding him too speculative and 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 55 



adventurous to suit his own extremely cautious temperament, 
he dissolved the connection, and Macfie went on alone with 
great success till his career was cut short by consumption. 
His wife, whom he brought from Scotland, is still living, as 
are also his son James Macfie, of Fairfield, and his daughter, 
Mary Jane, the wife of my esteemed friend Colonel F. W. 
McMaster. 

Mr. Wallace was a regular member of the Methodist 
Church, and he reared a numerous and highly respectable 
family, whose members all received the best education the 
times afforded, and married well, many still remaining here. 
His time for many years was passed in watching over his large 
investments in banks, railroads and other corporations. He . / 
was the projector and President of the first Columbia Insur- 
ance Company, but the business was too hazardous to suit his 
taste, and he gave it up, whilst yet moderately prosperous, 
and the result proved the correctness of his judgment, for 
such extensive fires happened soon after as would have bank- 
rupted the company. His habit for a long time was to spend 
a portion of the Summer months in the mountains, and he 
owned a commodious dwelling^ just South of Asheville, N. 
C, which afforded a wide and beautiful view overlooking 
the valley of the Swannanoa River. No concern was ever in 
danger of failure if he partook in its management. His in- 
surance company had in succession as Secretary Peter W. 
Knapp, John Agnew and John Glass. The last named wed- 
ded Mrs. Ancrum, widow of a rich old gentleman in Camden 
and daughter of Jesse Arthur, a carpenter by trade, who lived 
in both Granby and Columbia. Some of Mr. Glass's family 
still reside among us, as do also Mr. Agnew and some of his. 

From Barrett's store to the corner above the space was 
occupied by the elegant residence and lot of David Coulter, 
a Virginian by birth, whose four daughters, refined and ac- 
complished ladies, were united in marriage, respectively, with 



56 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Edward Bates of Missouri, and David Means, William Har- 
per and William C. Preston of Columbia. Within the en- 
closure in front of his house stood a large and beautiful wild 
orange tree, with branches overshadowing the sidewalk. He 
sold the place to Barrett for ten thousand dollars, and went 
to Missouri, whither Chancellor Harper also removed, but 
returned in a few years. 

Barrett divided the ground into several lots and sold them 
for a large profit; John Russell, from the up country, buying 
the house for $10,000 and converting it into a hotel. The 
corner was bought by John W. Wilkins for $4,500, and on 
it. he built a store and boarding house. This corner was 
afterwards occupied for many years by Pollock &: Solomon, 
(Levi Pollock and Phineas Solomon,) auctioneers and dealers 
in groceries and provisions, with Lewis Levy, who married 
one of Pollock's daughters, as a clerk and partner. Dr. Wil- 
liam Branthwaite purchased the lot next below Russell's 
hotel, where he erected a drug store and dwelling. Where 
Dr. Miot's drug store now stands, Barrett put up a small 
building that he first rented to Benjamin Rawls, the ingeni- 
ous and industrious blacksmith, who used it as a silversmith 
and repairer of clocks and watches. Mr. R. lived to be a 
very old man and was the j^rogenitor of all the Rawlses in 
and about Columbia. McCord & Nott (David J. McCord 
and Henry Junius Nott) afterwards occupied this building as 
a law office. They used to lend me books from the College 
Library. McCord, a short, well set man, with sallow^ com- 
plexion and very black hair, had for his first wife a Miss Wag- 
ner of Charleston, and several years after her death took for 
his second a daughter of Hon. Langdon Cheves, a lady who 
distinguished herself by devotion to the Confederate cause 
in contributing her time and money for the relief of our des- 
titute and suffering soldiers. She lost a son in the war, who 
was married to a daughter of Rev. Dr. J. L. Reynolds, Pro- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS, 57 



fessor in the College. He possessed great humor, consider- 
able effrontery and undoubted courage; proving the latter 
by always promptly resenting an insult, but never engaging 
in a duel, even when challenged, as was too common with 
gentlemen in those days. He took part in all the political 
and other public discussions and controversies going on, 
using both tongue and pen without much regard for the feel- 
ings of his opponents. Once, when invited to the field of 
honor by Dr. Elias Marks, he replied by going to the Doctor's 
house, knocking at his door, and, when the latter appeared, 
collaring and dragging him into the street, where they boxed 
each other till tired out; and when the Doctor, in his for- 
mal, precise manner, said: "Our physical energies are ex- 
hausted;" McCord, rejoining: "D'n you, I have energy 
enough left to whip you," renewed the combat. At another 
time, during his argument before the Senate in the case in- 
volving the ownership of McGowan's or Stark's Ferry, across 
Broad River, old Bolin Stark pronounced one of his state- 
ments false, when, though not more than half the old gentle- 
man's size, he struck him in the mouth with a lawbook; 
whereupon Stark knocked him, it was said, over seats and 
desks clear across the room. And he caned William Cline, 
the editor, with his own stick, for disrespectful remarks about 
some transaction in which they disagreed. He was in Paris 
when the revolution of July, 1830, occurred; and I have 
heard him describe, very graphically, the action of the stu- 
dents in the Polytechnic School, who tore up the pavements 
and used the material to barricade the streets against the 
attack of the government troops. 

Henry J. Nott, a son of Judge Abraham Nott, practiced law 
but a short time, when he took a trip to Europe and brought 
back a pretty little French wife. Soon after his return the 
Faculty of South Carolina College elected him to the chair 
of Rhetoric, Belles Lettres and English Literature. On their 



58 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 

way to the North he and his wife were drowned by the wreck- 
ing of a vessel between Charleston and Wilmington. It was 
reported that he could have saved himself, but in trying to 
help her both were lost. Of very humorous and playful 
disposition, he wrote regularly for the Southern Review, and 
published a book, full of fun, entitled " The Adventures of 
Thomas Singularity and Other Tales." 

In another shipwreck that occurred on the same route, 
some years later, Judge Butler, Colonel Preston and William 
L. Lewis, Senator from Alabama, who weighed more than 
four hundred pounds avoirdupois, were on board, returning 
from Washington at the close of a session of Congress. At 
a late hour of the night, when the passengers were all asleep, 
they were roused by the cry that the vessel had met with an 
accident and was in the act of sinking. The boats were 
hastily lowered, and, when Butler and Preston had entered 
one, Lewis appeared in dishabille, but the sailors, declaring 
that they could not take so much additional weight, were 
about putting off without him, when Butler swore that he 
should not be deserted, and, if the boat went down, they 
would all perish together. They returned safely to Wilming- 
ton, but, on arriving there, the question arose how Lewis 
could be taken ashore more than half naked, for there was 
no garment on board that would begin to cover his enormous 
bulk. Even when clothed he was ''the observed of all ob- 
servers," but in his condition at that time he would have 
excited as much curiosity as now would Jumbo, whom he 
.somewhat resembled. Fortunately, one of Colonel Preston's 
old night gowns was found, in which he was wrapped and 
smuggled into a carriage that conveyed him to a hotel, where 
he lay by till a suit could be made for him. 

At Washington no seat in the Senate was big enough for 
him, and a settee or sofa had to be introduced for his special 
use. WMiile the currency question was under discussion at 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 59 



the National Capital, a caricature appeared entitled ''Expan- 
sion and Contraction," showing Lewis seated beside the 
attenuated form of F. P. Blair, public printer and editor of 
the Globe, whom Governor Pickens characterized as a galvan- 
ized corpse. I had seen him often when he was a young man 
attending College in Columbia, and he was then very stout. 



CHAPTER XL 

COL UMBIA.— Continued, 

PRIVATE DWELLINGS AND THEIR OCCUPANTS. 

The Beards, Taylors, Hamptons, Wades, DeSaussures, Notts, 
Starks, Guignards, Herbemonts, Chappells, Fisuers, McGowans 
AND Others — The Lunatic Asylum — First Theatrical Perform- 
ance — Circus and Ball Room. 

Off of Main street there were no stores that I remember. 
On the South side of Camden street, Thomas Beard, the 
ancestor of the large and respectable family that bear his 
name, had a baker's shop. He attained a great age, and in 
his last years became quite deaf and partially insane, but, be- 
ing harmless, was allowed to go at large. Sam Wilson's 
blacksmith shops were on the North side of Lady street, be- 
tween Main and Sumter. 

And now, having gone the rounds of Main street as it was 
from 1817 to 1822, I will briefly notice the principal private 
dwellings with their owners. 

Colonel Thomas Taylor, the proprietor of the land on 
which Columbia stands — which he was said to have bought 
for an old horse and a rifle gun — lived near the Taylor bury- 
ing ground and Taylor's spring, where public meetings were 
sometimes held. His house stood there to a very recent 
period. He had served faithfully as a soldier and an officer 
in the Revolutionary War, but was too old to take an active 



60. RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



part in public affairs during my time, yet I once heard him 
make a short address, warning the people against the dangers 
of nullification, when his venerable appearance and evident 
sincerity commanded the respect of his audience, although 
most of them disagreed with him on the subject. His de- 
scendants, by their numbers, wealth and character, have 
always occupied a prominent position in the public and 
private life of the town and County. His son John, Con- 
gressman and Governor, lived on Arsenal Hill in the house 
now owned by Colonel A. C. Haskell, and his children 
were connected by marriage with some of the leading families 
in the State. Several of them went West, and of the old 
stock that stayed here but two remain — Captain Alexander 
R. Taylor, whose pure and useful life is recognized by all, 
and Mrs. Rhett, the venerable mother of our worthy Mayor, 
relict of Albert Rhett, the brilliant and somewhat aggressive 
politician and lawyer. The Columbia Male Academy was 
built about the year 1829 on a lot given for the purpose by 
Governor John Taylor. The funds for establishing the 
Female Academy were the proceeds of a lottery projected by 
Judge Nott, with the assistance of Governor Taylor, and 
some of the lottery tickets are still in existence. Some of 
the family colonized Taylor Town, on the Eastern suburbs of 
Columbia ; Major Tom Taylor, who removed to Alabama or 
Mississippi, owning the original building of the present 
Benedict Institute, and Colonel F. H. Elmore's residence 
being across the street from it, while others extended further 
East. Of the older members, I recollect Major Thomas, 
Colonel Henry P., (whose daughter married David Yates,) 
Jesse P., Benjamin F., (father of Colonel Thomas and Dr. 
B. W.,) Dr. James H., General William Jesse and George, 
but there Avere several besides these. 

As already mentioned, General Wade Hampton, Sr., had 
bought the original Preston mansion from Ainsley Hall. I 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 61 



had no personal acquaintance with the old gentleman, but 
knew generally that he had rendered distinguished service 
and risen to high rank in the Revolution, and also that he 
had become immensely rich by judicious investments in real 
estate in this State and on the Mississippi River. He was 
always on horseback when I saw him, and seemed to be a 
thin, wiry, fiery horseman, who sat as easy and erect as any 
youth of one-fourth his age. His son. Colonel Wade, was a 
complete model and specimen of the old time, outspoken, 
•open-handed Carolina gentleman. He was a young man on 
his father's plantation up the Mississippi when the news 
came that the British were invading Louisiana, and, leaving 
his business, he went immediately to New Orleans and 
tendered his services to General Jackson as a volunteer, who 
made him one of his aides, and he acted gallantly and effi- 
ciently in the defense that terminated in probably the greatest 
victory on record — the loss of the Americans being only six 
or seven, whilst that of the British exceeded twenty-five 
hundred. He was said to have brought the first news of the 
battle to Columbia, riding the whole distance on one horse. 
When offered ten thousand dollars for one of his race horses, 
he refused the offer, saying if any man in America could 
afford to keep a horse at that price he could. His liberality 
in endorsing for his friends cost him very dearly. General 
John S. Preston married one of his sisters, and ex-Governor 
John L. Manning another, a third being the wife of Thompson 
T. Player, of Fairfield. The former sold his wife's share of the 
Louisiana property, before the war, for one million dollars. 
Of his son, our late Governor and present United States 
Senator, nothing that I could say would begin to express the 
admiration and love entertained for him by the people of 
South Carolina and of the Southern States in general. His 
first wife was a sister of General Preston, and his second a 
daucfhter of Governor McDuffie. The females of the familv 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



have been proverbial for their kindness and charity to the 
poor, many of whom depended upon them for support. Mrs. 
Wade Hampton, Sr., when on the way to Augusta once, 
discovered old *'D. W.," (David Winchell,) of Lexington, 
lying drunk on the roadside, where he had fallen on some 
rocks and bruised his face. Fearing he might be seriously 
injured, she stopped, got out, and, taking some spirits from 
her carriage, began to bathe his wounds. This roused him, 
and he said to her. " My dear madam, you are putting it in 
the wrong place," at the same time extending his hand for 
the bottle, which she gave him, supposing that he best knew 
where he was hurt, when to her surprise and disgust he ap- 
plied it to his mouth and took the biggest sort of a drink. 

Since writing this, I have been informed, by one who pro- 
fesses to know, that it was Mrs. Fitzsimmons, the mother-in- 
law of Colonel Wade Hampton, who was tricked by old 
D. W. 

Captain George Wade, another of the patriarchs of Co- 
lumbia, dwelt on Main street, opposite Steward's Hall. 
Chancellor DeSaussure's residence, afterwards owned by his 
son, Wm. F., some time United States Senator, was on or 
near the corner now occupied by Chief Justice Simpson. 
The Chancellor was the first Superintendent of the United 
States Mint, to which place he had been appointed by Gene- 
ral Washington. His grandson. Captain Wm. D. DeSaus- 
sure, commanded the Richland Vohmteer Rifle Company in 
the war with Mexico, and as Colonel of the Fifteenth Regiment 
was killed in the Confederate war. No braver man ever faced 
"the perilous edge of battle when it raged." Judge Abra- 
ham Nott lived in a large house somewhat back from Main 
street on the West side above Boundary, about opposite to 
O'Neale's store. His eldest son, Josiah, a distinguished 
physician, moved to Mobile,. Alabama. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 63 



Robert Stark, solicitor, whose dwelling, on Stark's Hill, 
is still in his family, had a large body and powerful voice. 
While quite a youth he had taken part in the battle of King's 
Mountain, during the Revolution, and he had several sons and 
daughters who were all respectably connected. His son 
Major Theodore Stark, recently deceased, had filled the office 
of Secretary of State and was afterwards Sheriff of Richland. 
Anthony Hampton, son of General Wade, called his father 
the world, Bob Stark the flesh, and Colonel Clifton, who was 
club-footed, the devil. 

MajoT" James S. Guignard (many years Ordinary and Clerk 
of the Court) had a large dwelling on the Northwest corner of 
Bull and Gervais streets, and owned the entire square, on 
which he planted an orchard, nursery and vineyard. His 
progeny, mostly daughters, intermarried with the Gibbeses, 
Mayrants and other prominent families. Many of his de- 
scendants still survive. 

On the Southeast corner of Bull and Lady streets stood the 
residence of Nicholas Herbemont, a Frenchman by birth, 
who was teacher of his native language in the South Carolina 
College, and married the wid6w Smythe. He had one son, 
Alexander, by a former marriage, I believe. He owned the 
whole square and planted it in flowers, fruit trees and grape 
vines, besides having a vineyard in the country, from which 
he made quite a quantity of very fair wine. From him prob- 
ably originated the taste for flowers and flower gardens which 
has added so much to the beauty and attractions of Colum- 
bia. His son married a Miss Bay, and somewhat late in life 
accepted the appointment of American Consul at some port 
on the coast of Italy, whither he removed with his wife and 
only son. After an extensive tour in Egypt and the East, he 
and his son died abroad and his widow returned to Columbia 
since the war, where she remained but a short time before re- 
moving to, or near, Cheraw, where she died. Old Mr. Her- 



Gi RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



bemont's place became the property of Captain Henry 
Lyons, by whom it was continued and improved as Lyons's 
garden, famous for its collection of choice fruits and flowers. 
It is now the property of Mr. Van Benthuysen. 

Colonel John J. Chappell lived on the corner now occu- 
pied by Dr. Woodrow's Presbyterian office and dwelling. 
After Colonel Chappell's removal to Mississippi, his place was 
bought by Dr. John H. Boatwright, in whose hands it re- 
mained till burnt by Sherman's army in 1865. His father 
was a faithful Revolutionary soldier. 

Mrs. Malone had a large yellow house on the hillside near 
the present site of Wing's mill, and in the adjoining bottom 
was the somewhat celebrated Malone's Spring. 

The abode of Dr. Edward Fisher, Sr., was on Plain street, 
the present residence of Captain Bachman, whose wife is the 
daughter of Dr. Edward H. Fisher, deceased, a nephew of 
the old Doctor. This, Stark's and Wallace's, are the only 
buildings remaining in the families that owned them in 1817. 
Dr. Fisher was a Vestryman of Trinity Church, but when 
provoked would use profane language. The following anec- 
dote, often told of him, was so characteristic that it might 
have been true: It became the duty of himself and ^'old 
Bob Stark," alternately, to read the service in the absence of 
the clergyman. This duty he discharged without hesitation, 
but Stark refused, and Dr. Fisher on going to the pulpit to^ 
take his place exclaimed : "D — naman that won't pray when 
his turn comes !" 

Robert Waring, another old settler, quit playing back- 
gammon with Major Guignard because the Major laughed as 
much when losing as when winning a game, and thus de- 
prived the victor of one-half of his satisfaction. 

At the Northwest corner of Bull and Washington streets 
was the home of Spencer J. Mann, an old bachelor and 
officer in the Branch Bank, who went crazy for love of Miss 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 65 



Levy, sister of Chapman Levy. L C. Morgan and Alexan- 
der Falls by turns owned the building, and when burnt by 
Sherman's troops in 1865 it belonged to Mr. Falls's widow, 
who had not long before married D. Plympton Kelly. 

Dr. James Davis's residence was on the Northwest corner 
of Plain and Sumter streets. Of his sons, Captain Henry C. 
Davis, father of R. Means Davis, at present Professor of 
History in South Carolina College, resides at Ridgeway, in 
Fairfield. One of Dr. Davis's daughters married Edward G. 
Palmer, deceased, long the President of the Charlotte and 
South Carolina Railroad, and another was the second wife of 
Wm. C. Preston. Once it was said old Dr. Cooper rode his 
little white pony to Dr. Davis's, where he was very intimate, 
soon after its tail had been closely shaved by some of the 
students, and, being asked what ailed the pony's tail, replied 
''that is the fashion," which being heard by Dr. Davis's 
coachman, he resolved to follow the fashion, and forthwith 
shaved the tails of his master's carriage horses. Dr. Davis's 
house afterwards became the residence of Levi Sherman, and 
still later of Dr. Samuel Fair. 

Across Plain street from Dr." Davis's was the dwelling of 
Dr. Thomas Wells, of Connecticut, who made a fortune by 
the practice of his profession, and lived here till about 1855, 
when, after spending two or three years in Europe, he re- 
turned to New Haven, his native place, but still owned con- 
siderable real estate in Columbia till the close of the war, in 
1865, the burning of his houses by Sherman causing him a 
very heavy loss. He and Dr. Davis, from differences in poli- 
tics and other causes, were lifelong, bitter enemies. Dr. M. 
H. DeLeon lived North side of Plain street, between Bull 
and Pickens. 

Mr. Andrew Wallace's dwelling was on the Northwest cor- 
ner of Boundary and Pickens streets, opposite the Lunatic 
Asylum, which Jabez Warner and Wm. Gray were building 
in 1821, and I stood upon the walls while they were going up. 



66 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Mrs. Elizabeth McGowan (mother of Henry McGowan, 
who still lives here, and of Mitchell McGowan, long since 
dead,) kept a boarding house in the building on Northeast 
corner of Gervais and Assembly streets, now occupied as the 
Washington House by Mrs. M. W. Stratton, a daughter of 
George Nutting and author of many very pretty pieces of 
i3oetry, whose deceased husband, S. E. Stratton, was a part- 
ner of Levi Sherman in the saddlery business and a close 
relation of the famous General Tom Thumb. 

Mrs. Herring lived on the Northeast corner of Taylor and 
Assembly streets, where Henry McGowan now resides. She 
had one son and two beautiful daughters, the elder of whom, 
Eliza, married Dr. Green. 

Rev. Robert Means's dwelling was North side of Plain 
street, just back of Agnew's present store, and a short dis- 
tance West of it was that of the Hennesses, painters by 
trade, who had a dashing young sister, 

John Suder, a French dancing master, built a large two- 
story house for a ball room and public hall on Sumter street, 
nearly opposite to Trinity Church, where I first witnessed a 
theatrical performance called '' The Midnight Hour." The 
first exhibition of a circus was on the North side of Camden 
street, near the present site of McKnight's stables. One of 
the best riders— a little red-headed fellow named Yeaman, 
who shortly afterwards broke his neck while performing at 
Augusta — left a widow that subsequently married old John 
Robinson and frequently showed off in the ring on her 
famous mare Beeswing. Charles Young's theatrical company 
came here every winter for some years and performed nightly 
about two months, producing the principal stock pieces then 
on the stage, in which he and his wife (a very beautiful and 
accomplished woman) frequently appeared. An Irish come- 
dian of Young's company, named Quinn, quit the stage and 
studied law in Columbia, where he was admitted to practice 
and remained a few years. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 67 



Peter Clissey, a painter by trade, also kept a dancing 
school, and old Scipio, a slew-footed, French West India bar- 
ber and fiddler, made music at all the balls, usually inquiring 
at the close, "Now you sassify?" 

John Bynum, a very tall, thin, cynical old man, lived in a 
small white cottage next North of the Presbyterian Church. 
He had a good library and often lent me books. The 
Douglases were among the old settlers, but I have forgotten 
the location of their homestead. 



CHAPTER Xn. 

CO L UMBIA.— Contmiied. 

Remarkable Negroes— Lawyers— Colonel James and General Maxcy 
Gregg— Colonel Blanding— Columbia Canal— State Road— Sa- 
luda Factory — Railroad Bank — Water Works— Chapman Levy — 
Trial of Wm. Taylor — Duel — Academies, Schools and Watering 
Places, 

Two or three other remarkable negroes may as well be no- 
ticed here. 

Ben. Delane, whilst a slave, hii:ed his time and owned boats, 
which he ran on the river, commanding one himself and em- 
ploying hands to work it and another — the two always going 
together. His character for industry and integrity was 
beyond reproach and he could get credit for all he asked. 

Alfred Parr, an African by birth, who came to this country 
at an early age and died here last year, had more than ordi- 
nary intelligence, especially as to public matters, and pre- 
served many records of long past events. He and I became 
acquainted when both were boys, and only a few years ago 
he loaned me a copy of Dr. Maxcy's sermon on the death of 
John Sampson Bobo of Spartanburg, who, while in College, 
was drowned in the Congaree in 1819, and whose lifeless 
body I recollect seeing as it lay on the river bank near 
Young's mill, soon after its recovery from the water. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Old Sancho Cooper, also an African, belonged for many 
years to Dr. Thomas Cooper, President of the College, who 
was 'generally regarded as an infidel, though he professed to 
be a Unitarian, whose remains, I heard, were refused burial 
in the Presbyterian churchyard. Sancho was a highly re- 
spected member of the Methodist Church and long officiated 
as a preacher to the colored people. His son, Sancho, who 
is still living and who waited on me through a protracted 
spell of sickness in 1876, '77 and '78, came from Africa 
when quite a child, and he tells some interesting anecdotes of 
Dr. Cooper's indulgence to himself and to his own children, 
often in spite of the wishes and remonstrances of Mrs. Cooper. 
He says that the Doctor for two or three months before his 
death had old Sancho to pray with and for him regularly 
every night and morning. 

Among the other respectable colored people that accumu- 
lated property were Mary Purvis, mother of Christopher 
Haynesworth, Jim Patterson and his wife Sally, Sarah 
Haynes, Green Guignard, Nero Waring, Richard Holmes, 
and Joe Randall, trumpeter to the cavalry. 

The leading lawyers were James Gregg, Abram Bland- 
ing, John J. Chappell, Robert Stark, — who was suc- 
ceeded as Solicitor by Major John S. Jeter of Edgefield, — 
Chapman Levy and Claiborne Clifton. Their ranks were 
increased in a (ew years by David J. McCord, Wm. C. Pres- 
ton, Wm. Harper, James H. Hammond, Franklin H. Elmore, 
Wm. F. DeSaussure and others of less note. 

Colonel Gregg, slow, plodding, clear-headed and indefati- 
gable, disdaining all ornament, confined himself strictly to 
the law and logic of his cases, and never went to trial with- 
out thorough preparation, generally examining his witnesses 
beforehand, so as to know exactly what questions to ask and 
what to avoid asking, the latter often being as important as 
the former. By dint of strict method, unceasing industry 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



and close application, he acquired such knowledge of his pro- 
fession as enabled him sometimes to dictate to the Judges of 
the Appeal Court a reversal of the decrees they had made on 
the Circuit and was obeyed. He served at least one term in 
the Senate, and took part in the political discussions of the 
day; but nothing was allowed to interfere with his devotion 
to the law, in which his opinions, never hastily given, were 
received with all the authority of an oracle. He was truly 
"a man without guile," if God ever made one. His wife 
was a daughter of Dr. Maxcy, President of the College, and 
his son, Maxcy, lost his life in December, 1862, at the battle 
of Fredericksburg, where he had attained the rank of Briga- 
dier General, one of his last utterances being to the effect that 
he died contented in defending the principles of the State of 
South Carolina. His remains were received in Columbia 
(where he was born) with great parade, during the session of 
the Legislature, and they lie buried in a beautiful spot in 
Elmwood Cemetery. His memory will ever be cherished by 
the people of his native city and State as one above the sus- 
picion of any mean or dishonorable act. I saw him for the 
last time in November, 1862, at'Berryville, a few miles East 
of Winchester, Va. , where he was attended by his staff 
officers, those gallant and noble gentlemen. Colonels A. C. 
and J. C. Haskell, Dr. J. W. Powell, and by his faithful ser- 
vant, Wm. Rose, — better known as Bill Barrett, — who in 
1820 had belonged to my old master, Jacob Barrett. 

Colonel Bland ing, a Northern man by birth, married a 
daughter of Chancellor DeSaussure, and removed to this 
place from Camden. Though never mingling in politics, he 
was one of the most useful, enterprising and public-spirited 
citizens that ever lived in the State. As Superintendent of 
Public Works, he projected the opening of the Columbia 
Canal and similar improvements on the Broad and Catawba 
Rivers, as well as the State Road from Columbia to Charles- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



ton, which was of great service in facilitating intercourse 
between those places. He was the first President of the 
Commercial Bank of Columbia, and of the South-Western 
Railroad Bank in Charleston, the latter being intended to aid 
the so-called Charleston and Cincinnati Railroad, in which 
scheme he took an active and conspicuous part, but in his 
time the road never extended beyond Columbia. He also, 
with David Ewart, originated the Saluda Factory, the largest 
cotton manufacturing establishment then in the State. Of 
his own accord, and at his own expense, he established our 
water works, obtaining from the Legislature the passage of 
an Act authorizing the City Council to contract with him for 
their erection; an'd importing from England the engine, ma- 
chinery and pipes for conveying water through our streets 
and supplying it to private houses and to the State institu- 
tions in the town, at a time when such a project was almost 
or quite unknown in the South. Under this contract the 
city conveyed to him that portion of Washington and Lady 
streets lying East of Pickens, with the square between them, 
extending to and including Henderson street from Washing- 
ton to Lady, and the length of one acre beyond, which thus 
became private property. Before his removal to Charleston, 
in 1838, he sold the water works to the city authorities at, 
I think, less than they had cost him, (some $15,000,) on the 
condition that the principal should run for an indefinite 
period, provided the interest was paid quarterly or semi- 
annually. 

Whilst here his home was on the street now called by his 
name, at its Northwestern intersection with Marion street, 
and he is said to have commenced the planting of oaks in 
our streets, which have contributed so much to the beauty 
and comfort of the city. Previously the streets were shaded 
by the China tree or Pride of Lidia. He bore the reputa- 
tion of a profound lawyer, especially as to real estate, and 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



practiced his profession in copartnership with his brother-in- 
law, the late Hon. William F. DeSaiissure. When I knew 
him he was past middle age, stout and well proportioned, 
slightly stooped in the shoulders, with a serious countenance 
and projecting under lip, looking always as if deeply absorbed 
in thought. His principal aim in life seemed to be the im- 
provement of his adopted State and her people, and to this 
end he freely gave his money and his time. What a contrast 
between such a life and that of the scheming and selfish poli- 
tician, whose ambition never rises above the level of his own 
promotion ! Of his family, I was acquainted with but two. 
Captain William Blanding, who practiced law in Charleston, 
commanded a company in the Mexican war, and subsequently 
removed to California, where, I believe, he died; and Col- 
onel James D. Blanding, an honored and honorable member 
of the bar at Sumter, who also served as a Captain in Mexico, 
and still survives. Colonel Blanding at one time owned the 
brick yard on the Canal, which he either bought from or sold 
to Chapfman Levy. 

Chapman Levy, who came here from Camden, was a lawyer 
of considerable ability and very popular manners. He pur- 
chased and dwelt in the old house formerly owned by Cap- 
tain George Wade, opposite to Steward's Hall, below the 
State House. In 1820 or 1821, "Stuttering Billy Taylor," 
as he was called, a brother of Governor Taylor, at his own 
house in Lexington, shot and killed Dr. Cheesborough, a 
young physician of the neighborhood, for alleged improper 
intimacy with his (Taylor's) wife. This unfortunate and 
tragical affair produced great excitement in the community, 
which was increased by the high standing of the parties. 
On the trial of Taylor for murder, in which he was acquitted, 
Levy was employed to assist in the prosecution, and in the 
course of his argument made use of some expressions that 
gave offense to Dr. James H. Taylor, a son of Governor 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Taylor, who, meeting him in Cokimbiasome time after, struck 
him with a stick or switch. This was followed by a duel 
between the parties, in which Levy received a flesh wound 
below the knee. Some months later, John McLean and 
Levy went fishing, and when the latter rolled up his trousers 
to wade in the water, McLean observed that Dr. Taylor 
must be a capital shot to hit so small a mark. When Tom 
Marshall, of Kentucky, shot James Watson Webb below the 
knee in a duel, he pronounced it the d'ndest lowest thing he 
ever did in his life. 

Dr. Marks' s and another female academy kept by some 
Northern men, whose names I forget, were on the Eastern 
side of the town, and old Mr. James Wood had a male 
academy on the West of Sumter street between Bland ing and 
Laurel, where George Bedell's livery stable was afterwards. 

Rice Creek Springs, about half way between Columbia and 
Camden, was a favorite watering place for many of our lead- 
ing citizens in the Summer months. And some years later 
Lightwood Knot Spring, some six miles above Columbia on 
the Charlotte Railroad, was very frequently visited for health 
and pleasure. 



CHAPTER XIIL 

COL UMB I A. —Continued. 

"THERE WERE GIANTS ON THE EARTH IN THOSE DAYS." 

William Capers, James O. Andrew, Samuel Dunvvodt, Jonathan 
Maxcy and Basil Manly. 

Among the clergy during my first sojourn in Columbia, 
(1817 to 1822) were William Capers, James O. Andrew and 
Samuel Dunwody, of the Methodist Church — the first two 
named afterwards becoming Bishops — and Jonathan Maxcy 
and Basil Manly, Baptists, all very remarkable men for intel- 
lectual powers, improved and heightened by practice and 
culture. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 73 



Bishop Capers entered South Carolina College in 1805, 
but left it before graduating and commenced the study of 
law, which he soon abandoned for the itinerant ministry of 
the Methodist Church. He was particularly distinguished for 
saint-like purity, humility and benignity of countenance and 
character; with the most melodious voice I ever heard, not 
excepting that of Wm. C. Preston or Whitefoord Smith. 
An excellent singer, he usually preceded his sermons by 
singing (solo) a verse or two from some hymn. In his ser- 
mon at the dedication of the Lutheran Church in Lexington, 
the power and pathos with which he described the utter 
humiliation of PeteV, when, falling at the Saviour's feet, he 
exclaimed, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, oh 
Lord!" were heightened and enforced by features and ges- 
tures so natural, appropriate and expressive of remorse, sub- 
mission and adoration as made a picture surpassing any I 
have ever seen on or off the stage. I recollect another of his 
discourses, addressed to the ministry, enjoining upon them 
great forbearance and consideration for the feelings and cir- 
cumstances of offenders, in enforcing the discipline of the 
Church. Although fitted to enjoy and adorn the most re- 
fined circles of society, he voluntarily devoted many years of 
his life to the instruction and elevation of the very lowest 
grades of humanity — the wild Indians of the West, and the 
still more ignorant and degraded negroes on the large plan- 
tations in the low country. 

Bishop Andrew's manner, mind and appearance were alto- 
gether different. With a short, stout body, a stern, for- 
bidding face, and voice like a trumpet, he was the very em- 
bodiment oi power in the pulpit. While the one was all 
meekness and gentleness, the other was all energy and force. 
The one might be compared to the soft, refreshing evening 
breeze, and the other to the raging tempest or tornado. 
Preaching at a camp meeting a short distance above Lexing- 



74 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



ton village, from the text, ''Woe unto that man by whom 
the offense cometh," the tones in which he thundered forth 
his denunciation of the offender resounded through the 
woods and over the hills, reminding one of the destroying 
angel in the Apocalypse, "flying through the midst of 
heaven, saying with a loud voice, woe, woe, woe to the in- 
habiters of earth." 

Mr. Diinwody was quite an original and eccentric charac- 
ter. Rather stout, below medium height, and somewhat 
stoop-shouldered, he had a face solemn as a tombstone, that 
was seldom or never seen to smile, and a voice as harsh as 
the rattling of a railroad train, and, under shaggy, reddish- 
gray eyebrows, a pair of deep-set, piggish-looking eyes that 
peered up cunningly at those with whom he conversed. Then, 
too, he was somewhat deaf and quite absent-minded. Once, 
when a carriage brought him from a camp meeting in the 
country to Columbia, he was found on arriving perched up 
on the seat behind. Whilst on the Lexington Circuit, some 
years later, he always spent the night of his appointment to 
preach in the village at my house, and, invariably dismount- 
ing in the suburbs, led his horse through the middle of the 
street, looking neither to the right hand nor the left. He never 
troubled any one for what he could get himself, and had 
learned what an old British Admiral said was better than a 
university education, namely, to shave in cold water. He 
tried harder and came nearer to giving out a whole hymn in 
one breath than any one I ever heard. On one occasion 
when praying with my family, which included a number of 
school boy boarders, he became so loud as to set the dogs to 
barking in the yard and run the boys out of the room lest 
they should disturb him by laughing aloud ; but he neither 
heard nor heeded the one or the other. And notwithstand- 
ing his many oddities, his deep, unaffected piety, extraordi- 
nary memory as to the Scriptures and acute powers as a logi- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 75 



cian commanded the attention and respect of all who knew 
or heard him. In the closing services of a camp meeting 
near Piatt Springs, in Lexington, he put quite a damper upon 
the efforts of some speakers who had preceded him and 
urged the congregation to come forward and join the church, 
by remarking that when the Devil failed to check the conver- 
sion of sinners, he sometimes thwarted it by thrusting among 
them some who were unworthy or insincere and whose early 
declension brought dishonor upon the cause. 

Dr. Maxcy was one of the greatest orators I ever heard, 
and I have listened to nearly all the most distinguished 
among us in the last sixty years. He was a native of Rhode 
Island, where his reputation for talents and piety was so emi- 
nent that he became President of Brown University at the 
age of twenty-four, and a few years later was promoted to 
the Presidency of Union College, Schenectady, New York, 
whence became to Columbia in 1804. Of short, spare stat- 
ure, he seemed so weak as to mount the steps of the pulpit 
with difiiculty. With dark eyes and complexion, he had very 
black hair, cut short in front and combed or brushed straight 
down around, his forehead. His voice was sweet and feeble, 
but he spoke so distinctly and deliberately that every sylla- 
ble reached the farthest corner of the chapel when I heard 
him. His language was very precise and select, and his sen- 
tences generally short, each one being complete in itself. By 
public request he delivered an address in the Chapel on Sun- 
day, the 4th of July, 1819. This, taken altogether, was a 
masterpiece, and in some portions of it he rose to a pitch 
that seemed inspired. When describing the meeting of the 
first American Congress, after dwelling at some length on the 
importance of the occasion and the tremendous consequences 
that might follow from their action, he suddenly departed 
from his usually smooth' and quiet manner, with a burst of 
enthusiasm that surprised and electrified the audience, as he 



76 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



spoke of ''the Virginia Demosthenes, the mighty Henry! 
who gives the full rein to all his gigantic powers, and pours 
his own heroic spirit into the minds of his auditors; they 
become as one man, actuated by one soul, and the universal 
shout is ' Liberty or death !' " And towards the close of the 
address, in alluding to the future power and extent of our 
country, he seems to prophetically anticipate our acquisition 
of territory on the Pacific slope, in the following beautiful 
and striking word picture: ''In these solitary regions, where 
the human foot never trod, where the human eye never pene- 
trated, the American eagle claps his wings, and, soaring West- 
ward, eyes the distant Pacific; while in his beak he bears the 
peaceful olive, and in his talons the gleaming thunderbolt." 
His son Ezek, at one time Captain of the Richland Volun- 
teer Rifle Company, married a Miss Dinkins and moved to 
the West. After the war his widow returned here, some- 
what demented, and, I believe, ended her days in the Luna- 
tic Asylum. Another son — Hart Maxcy, — a well known 
citizen of Columbia, has descendants now living in the 
vicinity. 

Mr. Manly was much younger than the others. His man- 
ner was pleasing and persuasive, and his presence and de- 
meanor so winning and magnetic as to give him great influ- 
ence over those whom he met or addressed. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 77 



CHAPTER XIV. 

COL UMBIA.— Continued. 

District and Other Officers— Sheriff, Clerk and Ordinary, Tax 
Collector, Crier of Court, Intendant, Chief of Police and 
Congressman— Flush Times— Prices of Produce— Tobacco In- 
spection—Credit System— Boats— Goods and Their Prices. 

In i8i 7 Simon Taylor was Sheriff of Richland ; James S. 
Guignard, Clerk and Ordinary ; Thomas Hutchinson, Tax 
Collector ; and old Mr. Barrillon, the French auctioneer, 
Crier of the Court, who always added to the prescribed for- 
mula of "God save the State," at the opening of the term', 
the words ''and the crier too." 

James T. Goodwyn was Intendant of Columbia, and Mi- 
chael J. Shaffer, Chief Marshal. Colonel John J. Chappell 
represented the District in Congress. William Hilliard suc- 
ceeded to the office of Sheriff, and Rev. Benjamin Tradewell, 
of the Methodist Church, to that of Tax Collector, while 
Joshua Sowden became Chief Marshal after Captain Shaffer's 
removal to Mississippi. Mr. Hilliard made a defalcation in the 
Sheriff's office, which "cost old Mr. Boatwright, one of his 
official sureties, upwards of twenty thousand dollars. 

At that time, and for some years following, all prudent 
merchants and planters were prospering. The prices of pro- 
duce averaged about as follows: Cotton, i6 to 19 cents, (in 
1825 it went up to 27); corn, 50 cents, which many old 
farmers contended was its natural, proper rate, that ought 
never to be increased or diminished ; bacon and lard, 10 to 
12; butter, 12}^ to 15; and eggs, 10 to 12^. 

Tobacco was raised extensively in the up country, and I 
have seen many a hogshead of it in the leaf rolling through 
Main street, by means of a frame at each end, with a pivot, 
on which it turned, attached to a pair of shafts, in which a 
horse worked. A State inspection for the article was estab- 



78 KANDOM KECOLLECTIONS. 



lished at Granby, and another at Charleston, where it had to 
be examined before being offered for sale, and if it failed to 
come up to the legal standard the inspectors were required to 
confiscate it by burning. All country produce was brought 
by wagons, and the farmers from a distance, when selling 
their crops, bought their annual supplies of such necessaries 
as they failed to produce at home. There being but few- 
country stores, and those in the villages generally scantily 
supplied, Columbia did a very large retail business through- 
out the winter months. The merchants, having none of the 
present facilities for readily replenishing their stocks, kept a 
large amount of goods on hand. These they bought, mostly 
in Charleston, on a credit of six to nine months. To cus- 
tomers of good standing they sold on a year's credit, allow- 
ing accounts to run till New Year, when, if not paid sooner, 
they were expected to be settled by cash or note bearing in- 
terest at 7 per cent. All the large dealers had their own 
boats, each manned by half a dozen stout hands, besides the 
captain or patroon. Light goods were hauled from Charles- 
ton by wagons, and sometimes, of a dry season, in the fall, 
when the river became too low for navigation, wagons were 
the sole reliance for transportation, and freights were enor- 
mously high, as much as four dollars on a sack of salt or a 
bale of cotton weighing a little over three hundred pounds. 
Salt sold at one dollar to one and a half per bushel, and for 
many years was handled in bulk, an apartment in the hold 
of the boats and the back stores of the merchants being swept 
clean, in which it was poured loose and measured out to cus- 
tomers by the half bushel. Jamaica rum and Cognac brandy 
brought three to four dollars per gallon — the former being 
generally preferred as the more wholesome. Corn whisky 
and New England rum (vile stuff made of West India molas- 
ses) retailed at one dollar per gallon. Very little fine wine 
was sold ; sweet Malaga wine and mint cordial, retailing at 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 79 



one dollar per gallon, were very popular with women from 
the country, whom we always treated when they came in. 
Holland gin, with Stoughton's bitters, before breakfast, and 
shrub, composed of acid, sugar and spirits, made up the usual 
drinks of the people, who used stimulants freely, both in their 
homes and when friends met abroad. Up to 1820 no temper- 
ance societies existed. Merchants invariably watered their 
liquors before offering them for sale, the common ratio being 
a tub full to a hogshead, or in that proportion, and I have 
helped to carry many a one for that purpose. Nearly all our 
sugar came from Havana, put up in oblong square boxes of 
about two hundred and fifty pounds. It was both white and 
yellow, very fine grained and exceedingly dirty. Refined 
loaf sugar, in long conical packages, covered with thick, dark 
blue paper, was so hard and solid that it would strike fire, 
both in and out of water. West India molasses — the only 
kind then known — was both black and sour. Tobacco, for 
chewing, was twisted in one pound parcels, and for smoking 
the entire plant was sold, with the leaves cleaned, pressed 
and sweetened. Thousands of chalk pipes were sold, the 
stem and bowl moulded in one piece. Cigars were rarely 
used ; they came from Havana and sold for high prices. 

Woolen and worsted goods were imported mostly from 
England — broadcloths selling at $6 to $10 per yard; the 
favorite color for dress coats was deep blue, with bright brass 
buttons. Frock coats were not admissible on state occa- 
sions. Pantaloons for winter were of all shades of cassimere ; 
and for summer, nankeen, both yellow and blue, was com- 
monly worn, the former having the preference. It measured 
five to seven yards in length and about half a yard wide. 
Corduroy, a cheap, dark drab ribbed stuff, was much used 
for coats and pantaloons. Vests of white or buff Marseilles 
and figured silk were very common. The latter have strangely 
gone out of fashion, since they were cheap, tasty and 



80 KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



durable. Flannel, both red and white, still continues in use, 
though less common now than it was then. Scotch plaids, a 
heavy worsted goods, of various patterns, was very fashion- 
able for men's cloaks, generally made with a cape coming 
below the elbows. For negroes, white plains, a coarse, thick, 
all wool fabric, was very extensively used. Travelers generally 
wore leggings of this stuff, to protect their pantaloons from 
mud and dust; they were wrapped around the legs, reaching 
from the ankles above the knees and fastened above and below 
with bands made of list. Blue plains, also a cheap woolen 
goods, were less popular than the white. Blankets were of 
three classes — duffle, point and rose — the first named plain 
white, coarse and cheap; the second like them, but twilled, 
with one, two or three short black bars in one corner to desig- 
nate the sizes — the smallest, called one point and having one 
bar, were used as saddle blankets ; the rose blankets had a 
rosette of bright colored worsted in each corner, nearly a foot 
in diameter, were of finer quality and brought higher prices 
than the others. Black worsted Kilmarnock caps from 
Scotland, with dark colored borders, were very much used by 
negroes and other laboring men. Brown linen from Ireland and 
Germany became very common a few years later, but just then 
no dry goods store failed to keep osnaburgs, a cheap brown 
flax or hemp cloth, widely employed for clothing by the 
lower classes and for bags and various other purposes. Thick, 
padded white cravats and black Barcelona silk handkerchiefs 
were worn around gentlemen's necks and bandanas for the 
pocket. Ladies' dresses of fine quality were of black silk, 
as they are now, and also of changeable silks, showing 
white with blue, yellow or pink; and of white or black 
Canton crape, which came in patterns, having a flowered 
border a foot or so in width at the bottom. And to my eye 
the black Canton crape, which clung close to the body, on a 
tall, well-shaped woman, was the most becoming garment 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 81 



ever worn. White dresses were composed of muslin or cam- 
bric. Bombazine and bombazette were extensively used for 
ladies' and gentlemen's wear. It was a thin worsted goods, the 
former mixed with silk, the favorite colors being black, green 
and brown. Calico then, as now, made most of the women's 
frocks or gowns. It sold for twenty-five cents per yard, was 
about three-fourths wide, and became quite thin after the starch 
had been removed by washing. And what seems strange, 
five and a half yards was the usual pattern for a dress, in 
which women then looked as well and were as much admired 
as now in twice the quantity. Checked aprons and glass beads 
of various sizes and all colors were in common use. Old 
ladies sometimes wore outside calico pockets, suspended from 
a band around the waist, and indoors had silver or gilt chains, 
with scissors and pincushions attached, hung round the 
neck. Fine shirts and sheets were made of Irish linen. For 
common shirtings, linings, &c., we had nothing but hum- 
hums, a thin, yard wide, thickly glazed cotton goods from 
the East Indies, which became quite sleazy when washed 
from the starch, but wore well. About the year 1820 North- 
ern made brown shirtings were introduced and had a great 
run, the price, $1 for three yards, being so cheap that every- 
body from the country bought a pattern or two; and they 
still hold their place in the market, though very much im- 
proved in quality and reduced in price. Great numbers of 
Madras handkerchiefs, from the East Indies, were worn by 
the negro women as shawls and on their heads. They were 
finely woven in bright colors and of good size. 



83 KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER XV. 

COL U MB I A. — Continued. 

Jacob AND Judah Barrett — John G. Dunlap — Henry Hook — Murder 
OF John Arthur — Henry Voss and John H. Eiffert. 

At Barrett's we kept dry goods, groceries, provisions, 
liquors, (both at wholesale and retail,) hardware, crockery, 
shoes, hats and saddles. Besides all this, he sometimes 
bought a drove of hogs and made bacon for sale. He also 
speculated in negroes, horses and real estate. Though hardly 
able to sign his name, and never looking into a book, he had 
unerring judgment as to the value of all sorts of property 
and a keen perception of the character and standing of his 
customers. One so shrewd, stingy and unscrupulous, situ- 
ated as he was, could hardly fail, in such flush times, to be- 
come immensely wealthy, especially as he was aided by his 
brother Isaac in Charleston, who also was a keen business 
man, and, as his partner, bought goods and sold produce for 
him. Nothing that promised gain came amiss to him. At 
one time Isaac sent him a hundred Jersey wagons, costing, 
with the harness, $25 each. These he sold in a few months 
at ^75. Again, a cargo of government soldiers' condemned 
coats or jackets, bought at a great sacrifice, were readily 
taken by the planters for their negroes at an advance of one 
or two hundred per cent, over cost. A gang of some twenty 
negroes from Charleston he soon disposed of at very large 
profits, keeping for his own use Armstead Booker, a good- 
looking, active carriage driver and barber, who attended to 
his horses and in the store, and Aunt Nancy, a first-rate cook, 
with her children, one of whom, Wm. Rose, (or Bill Barrett,) 
is now employed in the Governor's office at the State House. 

Armstead, the barber, would now and then get drunk, and 
once, when recovering from a debauch, offered Dunlap and 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



myself leave to shave off his whiskers (which he was very 
proud of) if we ever caught him in that condition again. 
Soon after we found him one night so drunk as to be unable 
to speak or move. Accordingly, taking a pair of shears, we 
cut off one of his whiskers clean and smooth. Next morn- 
ing when he came into our bedroom, and, as was his custom, 
went to look at himself in the glass, he was horrified at dis- 
covering what had taken place and broke into a furious pas- 
sion. But we claimed to have carried out his own proposi- 
tion, and he had to shave off the other whisker till both 
should grow out again. One Sunday, in the spring, Dunlap 
and I stole off to fish at Granby shoals. Barrett professed to 
be greatly enraged at this freak of ours, till the fine string of 
goggle-eye that we had caught were shown to him, and then 
he became perfectly quiet and reconciled. But we never 
went again. 

Some years after I left Barrett, he took Dunlap into copart- 
nership, and the old store was burnt down. He then went to 
Charleston, married a daughter of his cousin, Jacob Ottolen- 
gui, speculated largely in real estate, and, by his own account, 
(which should be taken at some discount,) became a million- 
aire, owning before the war a thousand negroes on his rice 
plantations near the Savannah River and very large bodies of 
land in Florida, besides numerous houses and lots in Charles- 
ton. I met him in the Charleston Hotel after the war and 
listened to a long account of his family troubles and his losses 
from secession. He died soon after, leaving a very valuable 
estate, curiously tied up by his will, and making Mr. George 
W. Williams his executor. 

Judah Barrett, his elder brother, spoke French and Ger- 
man, and, though not as successful in business as Jacob, was 
much his superior in knowledge of the world and its affairs. 
He conversed well and readily on general subjects, but was of 
very loose morals, being both a gambler and debauchee. In 



84 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



early life, before I knew him, he had joined the Methodist 
Church in Columbia and married a rich widow, the mother, 
I believe, of Captain Christian Bookter and John D. Frost, 
well known citizens of upper Richland. By this wife he had 
at least one son ; but he soon separated from her, was turned 
out of the church and went to Camden, where he was mer- 
chandising in 1817 and caused me to be sent to his brother in 
Columbia. I saw his wife frequently, and she seemed to 
mind the separation no more than he did. He was unsuc- 
cessful in Camden, and then came here, where he stayed with 
us, occasionally assisting in the store and acting as an auc- 
tioneer, for which he was well fitted by his loud voice, ready 
wit and quick perception. After I had gone to Lexington he 
became so fascinated by the beauty of a young girl, whose 
father (Henry Hook) lived on the Augusta road, four miles 
from Columbia, and whom he could not marry because his 
wife was alive, that he attempted to kill himself by taking 
laudanum, but was relieved from its effects by a timely use of 
the stomach pump. Eventually he succeeded in seducing 
her, with, report said, the tacit consent of her father, whose 
ignorance was dazzled by Barrett's apparent wealth. She 
gave birth to a son and he soon dissolved the connection. 
It led, however, to tragical consequences for her family. The 
old man, her father, got into a drunken quarrel with John 
Arthur, the first husband of Mrs. M. A. Holmes, at a public 
gathering. Arthur taunted him with the dishonor of his 
daughter, and in the fight that ensued was killed by Hook, 
who stabbed him with a long knife. He belonged to a 
wealthy and influential family, some of whose members did 
all in their power to have Hook hung for the murder, and, 
though he escaped the gallows, his conviction for manslaugh- 
ter resulted in his suffering a long imprisonment and brand- 
ing on the thumb with a hot iron, leaving him in a state of 
utter imbecility of mind and body for the rest of his life. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 85 



Jiidah Barrett, after following the auction and commission 
business, as a copartner of Jesse DeBruhl, engaged with Dr. 
Wells and Levi Sherman in a large speculation in Mississippi 
lands, which led to prolonged litigation between the parties, 
and finally made his home in New Orleans, where, I under- 
stood, he died in poverty. I learnt long afterwards that 
he was probably the father of John G. Dunlap, his appren- 
tice, who resembled him in his clear voice, glib tongue and 
curly black hair. 

In 1857, when in New Orleans, I met with Warren An- 
drews and Dunlap, who had been clerks with me at Barrett's 
forty years before, and we^had a short chat about old times. 

A large sign swung on a high post, bearing the inscription 
''East Granby Hotel, by Henry Voss," appeared upon the 
hill above the boat landing near Granby Ferry, where Dun- 
lap and 1 often went to superintend the loading and unload- 
ing of Barrett's boats. Voss was a tall, elderly German, in 
bad health, who had married an illegitimate daughter of 
Colonel David Myers and built a large store and tavern that 
were well patronized by the boat hands and others. The 
house stood broadside to the road, having the store in front 
and the dwelling in rear; a door (the upper half of glass) 
leading from one to the other. He had a mulatto boy, said 
to be his son, named Joe, or, as he called him, Yoe, to whom 
he was much attached ; as was shown by his calling Yoe up 
every day after dinner and examining whether he had eaten 
enough, by punching him in the stomach, and, if not satis- 
fied, by ordering him to "ko pack and eat tell his pelly stuck 
out." 

He made the acquaintance of John H. Eiffert, a very stout 
old double-chinned Bavarian, with sandy gray hair and a big 
round red face, mottled all over from excessive eating and 
drinking, who kept a store on Hollow Creek, in Lexington, 
where he had married a pretty young woman — a daughter of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Abram Mitchell, of Edgefield. Right and left shoes were 
just coming into use and they fitted Eiffert exactly when the 
right shoe was put on the left foot, and vice versa. Many 
people objected to them at first, because they could not be 
changed every day like the straight ones. Eiffert, on his 
way to Columbia for goods, generally crossed the river at 
Granby and stayed a night with Voss, to drink and talk of 
old times in the Faderland. On one such trip he brought 
his wife along, and after supper he and Voss went into the 
store to spend the evening, while their wives remained be- 
hind. The old men drank freely and each complained to 
the other of his wife's misconduct and insubordination, till 
they agreed to go into the back room and give the women a 
"d — n vipping." The women, whose curiosity was excited by 
the loud talk of their ''old men," listened at the glass door 
and gathered the purport of their proposed visit. Then, 
putting out their light, they awaited the coming of their lords, 
who blundered and staggered in, one holding the candle and 
both armed with cowhides. The candle was knocked or 
blown out by one of the women, who secreted themselves, 
and left the men groping about in the dark, when Eiffert en- 
countered Voss, and, mistaking him for his wife, exclaimed: 

''Now, you -, I gifs you hell in vonce !" and scored 

him unmercifully with the cowhide till out of breath, when 
he heard the latter calling out in piteous tones, "Mine 
freindt, my vife vip me!" 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 87 



CHAPTER XVI. 

LEXINGTON, 1822 TO iSjg. 

The Village— George Haltiwanger— A. H. Fort— Jacob Drafts — 
John Meetze — Mrs. Corley — The Well Curb — Ephraim Corley — 
Adam Mayer — Mrs. Stewart — The Hendrixes. 

In 1822 Lexington, twelve miles West of Columbia, on 
the stage road to x\iigusta, was a new village in the sand hills, 
the County seat having been removed to it a year or two 
before as more central and healthful than Granby, which 
stood at one edge of the District on the Congaree River. 

George Haltiwanger, from the Dutch Fork, held the office 
of Sheriff and boarded with A. H. Fort, Clerk and Ordi- 
nary, who occupied the lower story of the jail with his 
family. While in office, Mr. Haltiwanger married the only 
daughter of Frederick Kelly, a well-to-do farmer, a few miles 
above the village, and, after the expiration of his term, be- 
came a minister of the Lutheran Church. 'Squire Fort was 
a kind-hearted man, who never refused a favor, if in his 
power, when asked for it, but of strong prejudices and very 
odd notions, which he affected to pronounce in very odd lan- 
guage. His elevation to office led him to believe himself 
more learned than he really was, and very few men were as 
wise as he looked, when, in promulgating his decrees, either 
officially or otherwise, he seemed to say: ''I am Sir Oracle, 
and when I speak let no dog bark." His son William told 
of seeing him, when gunning, aim deliberately at a flock of 
partridges on the ground but a few yards distant, and that, 
after waiting to get them doubled to his mind, he pulled 
trigger, but the gun snapped. He grounded arms imme- 
diately, dropped the piece to the earth, and, without a word, 
walked off home, looking neither to one side nor the other, 
and William carried the offending gun home. Another time 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



he had carefully strapped his razor and sat down to shave 
before a piece of looking glass fastened to the bricks by his 
fireplace. The first pass that he made cut open his face 
nearly the whole length of the razor; the next was a broad- 
sword blow at the bricks, breaking off its entire edge. 
While discussing a disputed law point, when he was told that 
the Judges of the Supreme Court had unanimously decided it 
in a certain way, he settled the question by rising on his toes 
and declaring that "A. H. Fort never said so." He was a 
leading Baptist and sometimes preached, but what his ser- 
mons meant was as great a mystery to me as any in the book 
of Revelations. 

Jacob Drafts, (Old Jake,) a son of Granny Corley by her 
first husband, who lived on the road a mile or so below the 
Court House, acted as Deputy Sheriff, Constable, crier of 
the Court and auctioneer at Sheriff's and other sales. While 
crying out " Silence in Court!" he made more noise than every- 
body else did. He would come to the village and stay drink- 
ing a week at a time, annoying and wrangling with everybody, 
bragging, blackguarding and sometimes fighting, if sure that 
he had the advantage. Then going home, he would remain 
two or three months, working hard on his farm, disagreeing 
with no one, and quieting his thirst for spirits by filling him- 
self with water from his spring, till the appetite became irre- 
sistible, when, sometimes leaving his plough in the field, he 
would march up to the village for another week's debauch. 
While the temperance cause was prevailing he signed the 
pledge of total abstinence for a term of six months or a 
year, and kept it faithfully till the time was up, but on the 
very day that it expired would be found at the grog shop 
making up for lost time. This he did more than once. The 
poor fellow was killed while cutting down a tree, by its fall- 
ing on him and crushing his body, so that he died in a few 
hours. 



RANDOM KECOLLECTIONS. 



Adjoining the court house lot on the Northeast, John 
Meetze had a store and was putting up a large house for a tav- 
ern. Opposite to his store was another kept by Moses Jacobs, 
a Jew, with Lewis Levy, who still lives in Columbia, as clerk. 
Next above Jacobs's store was Charles Conner's blacksmith 
shop. About a hundred yards Southwest from the court 
house lived " Granny Corley," whose lands had been selected 
and bought for the public buildings, and who sold lots to 
persons wishing to live in the place. On the brow of the 
hill South of the court house stood a small single-roomed 
building, erected by Judge Gantt in one of his whims, which 
afforded a wide view East and South over the valley of 
Twelve Mile Creek, through which passed the stage road, 
across long, steep, red clay hills, covered partially by ledges 
and bowlders of granite. This building, from its form and 
appearance, was not inaptly called the well curb. In it my 
first son was born. On the hillside North of the creek dwelt 
Ephraim Corley, the butcher, who afterwards moved up to a 
new house that he built in the village, above the court house. 
With the exception of these houses and their lots, there was 
nothing but woods, the pine trees and blackjacks standing 
within twenty yards in rear of the court house. 

John Meetze, whose wife was a sister of West Caughman, 
to whom his own sister was married, did more than any and 
everybody else in building up the place. He helped all that 
needed help, employed the idle, visited the sick, borrowed . 
money from every one that had it to spare, agreeing to pay 
any rate of interest they asked, and laid it out in farming 
and timber lands; started a mill, a tan yard and a distillery, 
which was soon discontinued, on the creek, and established 
a shoe shop, whilst running wagons and teams to haul timber 
and bark to the mill and tan yard and lumber to Columbia, 
and to bring back goods for the store and shoe shop. He 
worked day and night, overlooking his various enterprises 



90 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



and laboring with his own hands at one or another. His 
devotion to his wife and children was unbounded, and he 
never punished one of his little ones except when it got hurt, 
accidentally or otherwise, then it was sure to get a scolding 
and slapping. Once, on his way to Columbia, he stopped 
at Sharp's, four miles from the village, and sent back a note 
by a stranger, begging his wife to keep the children from 
going near the well. He took no account of expenses, but 
regarded all his receipts as clear gain. He and West Caugh- 
man were prominent Lutherans, and a few years later they 
spent no small sum in erecting the Lutheran Church and in 
promoting education by employing teachers in the academy 
at Lexington, which was well attended by pupils from Co- 
lumbia, Sandy Run, the Fork and other places. Dennis 
Chupp, the famous mathematical genius, Amos Davis from 
Fairfield, Lemuel Boozer, (afterwards Judge,) Isaac H. 
Smith and Washington Muller, of Charleston, were by turns 
Principals in the academy, till it passed into the hands of 
Dr. Hazelius, President of the Lutheran Seminary. 

Adam Mayer, father of Dr. O. B. Mayer, of Newberry, a 
rich planter in upper Dutch Fork, bought a lot next below 
the court house and built on it a large house as a hotel for 
his mother, Mrs. Stewart, wife of Alexander Stewart, the 
tailor, whom she had married in her old age, although she 
was old enough to have been his mother. After some 
changes this house became mine. She was a hospitable, 
busy, bustling old lady, of large size, an excellent cook and 
housekeeper, who spoke quite Dutchy, and when excited 
used very rough language, as was the custom in the neighbor- 
hood where she was brought up. Her father was old Colonel 
Summers, long the King of the Dutch Fork, whose word of 
command to his regiment once was, "Hold up your heads 
and look like the Devil, look like me." 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 91 



Captain Mayer had been well educated, and was a good 
musician, playing beautifully on the violin and the piano. 
An easy-going, good-tempered, unselfish man, he seemed to 
care for nothing but enjoyment in the company of the idlers 
and loafers of the village, where most of his time was spent, 
to the neglect of his plantation. He never said "no" to 
any request for pecuniary aid, and would sign a bond or note 
as security almost without looking at its amount or consider- 
ing whether its principal was worthy or solvent. For ob- 
ligations thus assumed, when they amounted to a large sum, 
he was sued and his valuable property sacrificed. As Cap- 
tain of a cavalry company in the Fork, he owned a splendid 
gray parade horse, and expended no small sum in fitting out 
members who were too poor to pay for their equipments. 
While the tavern was going on, he and some of his compan- 
ions, for mischief, one night stole a fine turkey that his 
mother was saving for Court. She soon missed the turkey, 
and when the boys came in she said to her son: "Atam, my 
koppler is kone." "Oh no, mother, I reckon not," was his 
answer, to which she rejoined, insisting that he was certainly 
gone. They took the* turkey down on the hillside and put 
him into an empty crate, near where Jesse Owens had made 
a little flutter mill on the branch for the amusement of some 
of the children. Next morning a little stuttering negro of 
hers, in riding the Captain's horse to water at the branch, 
made a noise, to which the turkey responded by a loud and 
prolonged gobbling. The boy immediately galloped back 
to the house, so full of his discovery that he could hardly 
utter a word, but he called out "Mi, Mi, Mi, Misses, I find 
you tucky, mam." " Where? where?" she inquired. "Down, 
down, down," he repeated and then choked up, when she 
gathered a stick and took him whang over the head, exclaim- 
ing, at the top of her voice, " Shpeak, shpeak, and tell me 
whay my turkey is." This brought from him: "I find him 



92 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



in our crockeryware trunk by Mr. Owens's mill." She re- 
plied: "Owens, the poor devil, he aint kot no mill." But 
the turkey was found, and no one laughed more heartily than 
herself when the scene between her and the negro was re- 
peated. 

Jacob Lohnar, her overseer, whom she sometimes called "a 
mighty shaggy (shabby) fellow," on one occasion rode the 
horse to Charleston with some wagons, and, while going up 
King street, was overtaken by a troop of cavalry on parade, 
when the gray, in spite of all his rider could do, dashed for- 
ward to the head of the company and took the Captain's 
place, amid the cheers of the men in ranks, until, at Lohnar's 
request, the officer in command escorted him to Johnson's 
wagon yard, where, with difficulty, he was separated from the 
company. 

When Lafayette visited the State in 1825, Captain Mayer's 
troop formed a part of the escort that met the old General 
at the North Carolina line and accompanied him to Colum- 
bia. It mustered one hundred and twenty-five men, each one 
mounted on a white horse, all handsomely uniformed and 
beautifully caparisoned, and had the further distinction of 
escorting the General from Columbia to Charleston. 

The Hendrix brothers — John, Henry (old Mike) and 
David^soon after bought lots, built houses and removed to 
the village. John followed his trade of a carpenter, David 
that of a bricklayer, and Heary kept a tavern and store with 
the help of his son Leroy, who married Jane Corley, a 
daughter of Ephraim Corley. One of John's sons, Thomas, 
was the first husband of Mrs. Turnipseed the elder, and their 
daughter married Dr. Turnipseed, the distinguished surgeon 
and physician, who died here last year, his father being the 
second husband of his mother-in-law. David and his sons, 
J. A. (Austin), S. N. and Patrick, went to merchandising, 
and the two first named sons are now with us in Columbia. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 93 



Jacob Hendrix, a nephew of John Meetze, became a partner 
with his uncle in the store and shoe shop. He had seven 
sons in succession, who all attained to man's estate. 



CHAPTER XVn. 

Z EXING TON. — Conlin tied. 

R. H. GoLDTHWAiTE— Allen C. Stillman— The Court House— Bush 
Arbor — St, Peter's Church — Jesse Drafts — The German Luther- 
ans—Their Habits and Characteristics, Their Negroes, Their 
Clothing, Food and Furniture, Their Honesty, Fights and 
Weddings— Game— Superstition— Edgefield Ghost. 

There was no church, no school, no physician, and but one 
lawyer at the place — R. H. Goldthwaite, a well educated and 
well read Virginian. Allen C. Stillman, from Connecticut, 
was a Justice of the Peace, but he soon moved to Leesville, 
and thence, in a year or so, to Alabama. Mr. Goldthwaite, 
after marrying Miss Ellen Walker, an adopted daughter of 
Mrs. Elizabeth Surginer of Columbia, who had erected and 
occupied a cottage about a mile below the village, went to 
Spartanburg, and a year or two later emigrated to Alabama, 
where he had relatives in high judicial and political stations. 

For several years we had no preaching except when a trav- 
eling minister happened to stop on Sunday or at night, and 
then service was held in the court house, which served also 
for public meetings and exhibitions of itinerant showmen. 
On the Sabbath we went, generally afoot, to the Methodist 
meeting house at Bush Arbor, four miles, or to St. Peter's 
Lutheran Church, seven miles above — Rev. Thomas Rail 
officiating at the former and Godfrey Dreher or Yost Meetze 
at the other. At these places the country girls, to keep their 



94 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Stockings clean, carried them wrapped in their handker- 
chiefs till near the church, and then, sitting on a log, put 
them on before going into the meeting house. 

In a few months Jesse Drafts opened a school, charging 
one dollar per month for tuition, but it was several years be- 
fore the Lutherans built a church, and longer till the Method- 
ists commenced their place of worship, which was not com- 
pleted until a still later period. 

The people, mostly Germans, or their descendants, were 
nearly all Lutherans, there being not many Methodists, still 
fewer Baptists, and none of any other denomination. Very few 
had any negroes, and those but a small number, who worked 
with the white members of the family, all wearing pretty 
much the same clothing, which was made up by the white 
females, and eating the same food, but never at the same table. 
The negroes never went to school nor learnt to read and write,, 
but they had their own preachers and meetings on Sunday and 
were all Methodists. No colored people, and few others, 
ever lived easier or happier lives than they; they were well 
fed, well clad, attended to in sickness, provided for in old age, 
worked moderately, and relieved from all care as to the future. 

The people had all the characteristics and peculiarities of 
their forefathers in Germany; honesty, industry, economy, 
submission to their rules in Church and State, and a firm be- 
lief in dreams, signs, ghosts and witches. 

Many women worked in the fields with the men ; some- 
times planting, tending and picking out the cotton, then 
carding, spinning and weaving it into cloth, which they dyed 
and made into garments. Everybody wore homespun, ex- 
cept the clergy, the officers of the Court and those of the 
militia, whilst acting in their official capacity. Very few 
could afford the expense of a broadcloth coat, as required for 
militia officers, and therefore an arrangement was made for a 
newly elected Captain or Lieutenant to take the uniform of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 95 



his predecessor at a valuation and turn it over to his successor 
at the expiration of his term. 

When Bill Corley and Jake Gross were rival candidates for 
a Lieutenancy, the former very properly urged as an argu- 
ment in favor of his election that the coat of the former in- 
cumbent fitted himself better than his competitor. But 
Gross was elected, and gave evidence of his competency by 
his first words of command for a right wheel, saying in a low 
voice, " Come round this way boys, you know better than 
I do." 

They had a custom, that I have not met with elsewhere, of 
calling married women by the Christian names of their hus- 
bands; thus, Betsey, the wife of West Caughman, was called, 
not Betsey Caughman, but Betsey West, and Jacob Drafts's 
wife, Christena, was Tena Jacob. 

The people worked hard and lived cheaply, buying nothing 
but absolute necessaries, except whisky and tobacco for the 
men, and, perhaps, ribbons and calico for the women. The 
latter prided themselves upon the texture and coloring of 
their homespun, using indigo, copperas, madder, annato and 
logwood, besides certain barks and roots for dyeing, with 
Turkey red, a bright scarlet thread for stripes and checks. 
For their necessaries they went in debt to the stores till their 
crops were made, when they, with few exceptions, paid up at 
or before New Year, and if any surplus remained it was laid 
out and not laid up. The few exceptions to this rule began by 
lending on interest the small surplus from their earnings and 
adding to it from year to year. Their doctors, blacksmiths, 
shoemakers and all gave and took the same yearly credit. 
Many of the elders always bought the quarto German Calen- 
dar because it gave the signs for the weather and for planting 
more fully than the English Almanac. Their average height 
was greater than in other sections, insomuch that a close ob- 
server from Fairfield, who attended Lexington Court, said 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



he saw more long-legged boys and girls there in a day than 
Winnsboro could show in a week. And they were distin- 
guished from their neighbors across Broad River in another 
respect. As witnesses in Court they generally tried to tell as 
little as possible, whilst it was said of the descendants of the 
Irish, in Fairfield, that they went to the other extreme and 
always told at least as much as they knew. 

The rule of honesty was so universal that no one ever 
thought of locking up a house at night, and during my seven- 
teen years at Lexington but one burglary occurred in the 
village and its vicinity. For a year or two after my removal 
from Lexington to Columbia my front door was never locked, 
till an attempt to rob Colonel Goodwyn's bed room, when 
the thief, being suddenly alarmed, left a long Bowie knife on 
the floor, which taught me the necessity for greater precaution. 
And whilst acting as tax collector, although it was publicly 
known that I traversed the most londy and deserted portions 
of the District with a considerable sum of money, I never 
carried a weapon of any kind. Like young Lochinvar, 

" I rode all unarmed, and I rode all alone." 

A sale day, muster or election seldom passed without one 
or more fights, and when one commenced a dozen men, more 
or less under the influence of liquor, would be seen with their 
coats off, pulling and hauling, whooping and yelling, — some 
helping their friends, others crying ''Fairplay," — and in the 
crowd a blow given accidentally or otherwise would lead to 
another engagement. But no pistol, knife, or even stick, was 
ever used or thought of on such occasions. After a "rota- 
tion" of this kind, rotten apple, raw beef or alum curd 
would be applied to the gouged eyes. 

Deer, wild turkeys and smaller game were abundant in the 
swamps and sand hills, and every winter wild pigeons came 
in numbers numberless. Where they roosted at night, on the 
trees and bushes in Congaree Creek Swamp, parties went 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 97 



with sticks and killed them by hundreds. On their departure 
in the spring I happened one morning to be on the hill above 
the village, commanding a view of six or eight miles to the 
South and two or three both East and West, where for nearly 
an hour the whole horizon in every direction was filled with 
them as they passed in rapid flight toward the South. Con- 
sidering the number that must have been in sight at one time 
and the short period in which they were replaced by others, 
the aggregate would seem to be simply incalculable. 

Fire hunting for deer was not uncommon, one carrying a 
torch of fire, which reflected the light in the eyes of the 
game and showed the marksman where to direct his aim. 
Old Mr. Wilson on one occasion took three fair cracks at 
the moon, which he mistook for a deer's eyes, as she rose 
through the bushes. Moccasins of dressed deer skin were 
made and sold by the old hunters, furnishing a cheap and 
pleasant covering for the feet in warm, dry weather. 

They used no carpets, but white sand, washed free from 
dirt and dust, was sprinkled lightly over the floors and swept 
with a straw broom into waves and curves for ornament. 
Every family had a brick oven for baking on Saturday the 
week's supply of bread, fruit pies, when in season, and sweet 
potato custards, which were eaten cold ; the bread, generally 
a mixture of wheat flour and potatoes, raised with domestic 
yeast, called ''sour dough," which kept soft, moist and 
sweet, and it was, they said, more healthful and palatable than 
the hot corn bread so commonly used by other people. Then, 
too, no winter came without a barrel of sauer kraut in each 
house, made by fastening a fore plane bottom upwards and 
shaving on it the cabbage and turnips into shreds, then pack- 
ing them alternately with layers of salt, till the vessel was 
full, and covering it with a loose head and a heavy weight to 
keep it down and induce fermentation. A big round pewter 
dish of this kraut, with a little bit of fat bacon in the mid- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



die, flanked by roast pork or fried chicken, constituted their 
favorite meal at dinner, which was always taken at 12 o'clock, 
a midday mark being made on the floor, to which the shadow 
came at that hour. For breakfast and supper, coffee or tea 
was rarely used, clabber in summer and milk in winter com- 
monly supplying their place. Old Andrew Tarrar declared 
that taking tea, coffee and medicine was nothing but pride; 
that he ate soup for breakfast and milk for supper and never 
needed anything else. As for soups and fried cakes, the 
Germans had more and better varieties than any other 
nationalities in our country. They eat less hominy and rice 
than others; boiled their own soap for washing clothes and 
moulded their candles of tallow and beeswax. 

Their chairs were split-bottomed, with stools and benches, 
their tables of pine or oak, their bedsteads fastened with 
ropes passing through holes in the bars from side to side and 
from end to end, and they used straw beds instead of mat- 
tresses. Some old women could not sleep on bedsteads 
having slats in place of cords. Spittoons were unknown; 
when John Wise first met with one, he called it the biggest 
inkstand he ever seed. 

At weddings, which were nearly always in the forenoon, all 
neighbors attended with or without invitations, cards being 
unknown, and were welcomed with whisky to drink and a 
plentiful dinner, set out, when the weather permitted, on a 
long table of boards laid on benches under trees in the yard. 
Then the young folks and some of the old ones "walked for 
the cake," a ceremony confined, so far as I know, to the 
German settlers. For this purpose, those proposing to en- 
gage in the game contributed small sums of money, which 
were given to the bride, in payment for a large pound cake, 
that became the prize, depending upon the following chance: 
Each young man selected his partner of the other sex, and 
they, headed by the bride and groom, marched in double file 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 99 



around the house, where at the front door one stood with a 
long rod, which he handed to the first couple, and when they 
reached the door again it was taken from them and delivered 
to the next pair, who in turn surrendered it to their im- 
mediate followers. Meantime a party of three or four took 
a loaded gun into the woods, out of sight from the house, 
and after waiting a quarter or half hour fired it off, the couple 
having the rod in hand when the gun was fired winning the 
cake, which was usually cut up and divided among the 
players, the girls saving a small bit to put under their pillows 
at night, on which to dream of their future lovers. I have 
seen, and sometimes joined in, the parade with as many as 
thirty or forty pairs. Whenever old Jake Drafts and Nancy 
Jacob (wife of Jacob Kelly) were present, they took part 
in the sport. • He would call out in a loud voice, *' Where's 
Uncle Nance?" to which she laughingly responded, "I 
God, here I am," amid the cheers and merriment of the rest. 
As to their superstition, every one could give instances of 
witchcraft, apparitions and the fulfillment of dreams and 
signs. The Bible was their authority for the existence of 
witches, and they believed in the one as firmly as in the 
other. No neighborhood was without its witches — commonly 
a poor old deserted woman, who deserved pity rather than 
the fear and loathing that was her portion. If a cow ceased 
to give her usual quantity of milk, the remedy was to put a 
silver coin into the piggin or bucket before milking. If a 
man was ridden by the witches at night — such things never 
occurred in the day time — he had but to set up an image of his 
tormentor and shoot at it with a silver bullet, the result being 
that the witch was wounded in that place where the picture 
was hit by the ball. Conner, the blacksmith, made many 
a half dollar by moulding bullets for those thus afflicted, who 
brought their silver coin to be melted and moulded by him, 
which he put into the crucible and subjected to the heat gene- 



100 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



rated by blowing his bellows till it came near the melting 
point, when the bewitched person was called out of the shop 
long enough for the coin to be abstracted and its place filled 
Avith pewter and tin, the mixture being poured into the mold 
and coming out a white, shining ball, that never failed to 
wound or kill the witch and relieve the patient. 

John Drenan told Manuel Seastrunk another way to get 
rid of the witches that had plagued him for months. He 
advised him to bore a hole six inches deep, with an inch and 
a half auger, in a big post oak that stood some distance East 
of his house, and then to stop the hole with a hickory plug 
that fitted it tight, having a tube bored lengthwise through 
the plug with a gimlet, and, after ramming it down on a 
quarter pound of powder, to fill the tube with a fuse and 
touch it off while he stood directly in front to see the witch 
blown out. Seastrunk said he tried it, and the plug flew out 
close to his head, but he saw no witch. This poor ignorant 
creature, as recommended by Amos Banks, Sheriff, actually 
walked fifteen miles with a letter to Cage Martin's, who 
Banks said had the book containing a sure receipt for curing 
witches, and being told by Martin that Colonel Lee had 
just borrowed the book, he went three miles further, when 
Lee informed him that the volume was then in the possession 
of John Meetze at the Court House. At the village he learnt 
that Meetze was in the woods, near Congaree Creek, cutting 
logs for his mill, and thither he proceeded, relating to Meetze 
his misfortunes and begging him for help. But the latter had 
no relish for such sport, if it deserved the name, and he ad- 
vised Seastrunk to go home and attend to his crop, but he 
thought his adviser a hard-hearted, unfeeling man, who had 
no sympathy for those in distress. 

Another case was that of Martin Lybrand, a respectable 
farmer, whose character for veracity upon any other subject 
was undoubted, and who offered to swear upon a stack of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 101 



Bibles as big as the court house that a certain old woman 
living near him repeatedly changed him into a horse at night 
and rode him to a deserted house in the sand hills, where she 
hitched him to a tree, while she went into the building, and 
he saw lights and heard music and dancing till just before 
day. It may be stated, in explanation or excuse for this hal- 
lucination, that he was for many months in very bad health 
with some nervous disorder; but, beyond all question, he sin- 
cerely believed what he said, as did most of his neighbors. 

Old Mr. Ramick, on the public road, built a high rail fence 
around his house to keep out intruders, and actually refused 
a cup of cold water to all thirsty travelers, lest he might 
thereby give them the power to bewitch him or his wife. 

And this condition of things existed within ten miles of 
the capital of South Carolina as late as the year 1835. J^'^"^"'^ 
Strother, a little black-eyed, black-haired and dark-skinned 
fellow, said that he had been ridden in the same way by an 
old witch in the Dutch Fork, but that she made a great mis- 
take, for on looking at himself he was a bright sorrel, whereas 
he should have been a dark brown. 

The old hunters universally believed that certain persons, 
by *' using" or conjuring, could put a spell upon their rifles 
and make them miss the game that they were otherwise sure 
to kill, and there were various methods or processes for re- 
moving the spell and restoring the accuracy of their aim. 

Those who are old enough will remember the Edgefield 
ghost, that created a great sensation by conversing with a 
family of- good standing and its visitors in open day, whilst 
no one could be seen. This strange affair attracted so much 
attention that people came from far and near to witness and 
unravel the mystery; among others the Rev. Mr. Hodges, an 
educated minister of the Baptist Church, who published in 
the Edgefield paper an account of what he heard^ conclud- 
ing that it was beyond his comprehension. 



103 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

LEXINGTON.— Continued. 

Wm. Jones and John Caldwell — Speech of the Latter in Dutch 
Fork — My Election as Tax Collector and Marriage — Stenog- 
raphy AND Bookkeeping — Bishop Capers and Mr. Petigru — Revs. 
Thomas Rall, Godfrey Dreher and Yost Meetze— John Snyder. 

Wm. Jones, an early graduate of South Carolina College, 
from Edgefield, came to Lexington soon after I did, and 
opened a law office in rear of the court house in copartner- 
ship with John Caldwell of Newberry, a cousin of John C. 
Calhoun, who was said to have been the equal of the great 
statesman in their young days. Mr. Caldwell represented 
Newberry in the House of Representatives for many years, 
and was quite popular and successful as a jury lawyer, but he 
drank to great excess and lost the use of his lower limbs, so 
that late in life he walked with difficulty and could hardly 
stand, the Courts allowing him to keep his seat while speak- 
ing. In the House he clung to one of the columns when 
addressing that body, and Judge Butler said he could be 
always found ''at his post." I have heard the Judge tell, in 
Caldwell's presence, of a public meeting in the Dutch Fork, 
where the latter had been invited to address his constituents. 
According to Butler, a bar crossed the platform or speaker's 
stand in front, just low enough for Nick Summer to put his 
chin over it, but so high that Caldwell, who was shorter, 
could not see the crowd when speaking without stooping 
below the bar or standing on tiptoe all the time. No one 
present felt competent to draft the resolutions in honor of 
their guest, and, at their request, Caldwell himself wrote 
them out, eulogizing their distinguished Representative for the 
ability, fidelity and efficiency with which he had served his 
native District. Then, when they were read to the meeting, 
he rose and commenced by returning his thanks for the very 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 103 



flattering and unexpected compliment, &c. He was immod- 
erately fond of cards, and because I played a pretty good 
game of whist he helped to elect me as Tax Collector of Lex- 
ington in 1824, that office being then-in the gift of the Leg- 
islature. And thus my early knowledge of cards served in 
promoting me to office and increasing my income, which was 
very acceptable, as I had married in the spring of that year on 
a salary of a hundred and eighty dollars a year, with the 
board of myself and wife. This may seem to have been an 
imprudent step, but as we were both young and healthy, with 
no expensive habits or extravagant aspirations, we lived 
contented and saved something for a rainy day ; so that it 
proved to be the best thing I could have done. West Caugh- 
man, my brother-in-law, was also a member of the House, 
and between him and Caldwell my election was secured. In 
view of the strange way in which this promotion was effected, 
I advise all my young friends to never be afraid of learning 
too much, since one can never foresee how or where his 
knowledge may prove profitable. Not that I would recom- 
mend a course of whist or poker as an introduction to office, 
but as showing how chance has seemed to affect me on more 
than one occasion. 

For instance — after clerking for Mr. Meetze a couple of 
years, I, with his assistance, bought a small stock of goods 
and set up for myself. Whilst making purchases in Charles- 
ton, I picked up in a book store a treatise on stenography, and, 
in the leisure of a village store, practiced short-hand writing 
merely for amusement ; but the consequence was, that A. S. 
(Sid) Johnston, then State Printer, employed me to report 
the proceedings of the Legislature. And whilst thus engaged, 
a vacancy for Teller in the Commercial Bank had to be 
filled, to which I was elected on the recommendations of 
Judge Gantt, Judge O'Neale, Judge Glover, who was at that 
time Clerk of the House, and others whose acquaintance I 



104 KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



had made in the offices of Clerk of the Court and Reporter. 
Again, in the same way, I learnt bookkeeping, with no ex- 
pectation of ever using that knowledge except in my regular 
business; and now, after a lapse of more than fifty years, it 
gives me employment and remuneration for many an hour 
that would otherwise be spent idly and unprofitably. 

Jones had been a college mate of Bishop Capers, James 
L. Petigru, his partner Caldwell and other distinguished men. 
Among other anecdotes of his life at that time, he related 
that Mr. Capers delivered a funeral sermon on the death of 
a favorite dog, and that he, (Jones,) who was inclined to be a 
poet, composed a hymn that was sung by the students on the 
occasion. After leaving college, he corresponded with some 
of the students, many of whose letters he kept, and among 
them I recollect the beginning of a rhyming reply from Mr. 
Petigru : 

" Your Hudibrastic strains, dear Jones, 

Are sweeter, far, to me than tones 

Of any mocking bird or fiddle, 

Though many I have heard that did well." 

The habit of drinking increased upon him and he died a 
maniac. 

The office of Tax Collector, if properly filled, is the best 
of all stepping stones to public favor. It brought me in direct 
contact with every property holder in the District, and en- 
abled me, by diligence and courtesy, to secure their good 
will, so that any place in their gift was at my command, as 
was proven, after my re-election for a second term, by their 
making me twice Clerk of the Court and a delegate to the 
Nullification Convention of 1832 and 1833. The leading 
men of the District at that time deserve a passing notice, as 
I got acquainted with them at the village and in my rounds 
collecting taxes. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 105 



Rev. Thomas Rail, of the Methodist Church, kept a 
country tavern for travelers, four miles above the village on 
the Augusta road, and Thomas K. Poindexter had another 
five miles beyond. From being one of the worst and 
wickedest men in the world, Mr. Rail got converted and 
became a sincere and exemplary Christian minister, wishing 
well and doing good to all in his power. 

Reverend Godfrey Dreher, of the Fork, had charge of 
three or four Lutheran churches, where he preached on differ- 
ent Sundays every month, and was long looked up to and 
almost worshiped by his congregations, because among 
other reasons, he was a great stickler for old customs and ob- 
servances and opposed all measures of reform or innovations. 
I once asked a little boy who made him, and he replied 
"Godfrey," though he might have meant God. After using 
his influence in establishing the Lutheran Seminary at Lex- 
ington for the education of young men desiring to become 
ministers, he got into a serious and unfortunate controversy 
with some of his brother clergymen, partly on doctrinal 
points and partly because they weakened his power over his 
followers. This led to a division in the church and a law 
suit for the possession and control of some of the church 
edifices, followed with very bitter feelings and language un- 
becoming their sacred calling, in which both parties were 
sometimes to blame. Finally, I believe, he was formally read 
out of the connection by the Seminary party, but, supported 
by his adherents, he held on to a number of the churches, 
and brought from North Carolina the Efirds, ministers of 
the Hinkleite branch of the old Lutheran Church, whom he 
introduced as pastors of several of his former congregations. 
These disputes and dissensions continued for many years, 
and I doubt whether the feelings and passions then engen- 
dered have yet passed entirely away. Old Mr. Samuel Win- 
gard once told me that he had long respected Dreher as a 



100 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



preacher, but for the future he should treat him as a republi- 
can and a sinner. He always slept in church and insisted 
that it was a sign of a good conscience. 

Reverend Yost Meetze was quite an old man when I made 
his acquaintance. He was a Hessian by birth— one of those 
German soldiers that were sold by their hereditary Prince to 
the King of England for the subjugation of the rebels in 
America. Whilst a youth, his father's house in Hesse Cassel 
was surrounded at night by a squad of soldiers, who called 
up the family and commanded the boy to go with them. 
Unable to resist, he bade farewell to father, mother and the 
rest of the household, and was forthwith shipped off to the 
United States. He deserted from the British army in Charles- 
ton and made his way alone to the German settlement in 
Lexington, then a part of Saxe Gotha, where he married, 
settled a farm on a piece of excellent land near Saluda River, 
became a minister of the Lutheran Church, and reared a 
large family of sons and daughters, who all inherited healthy 
constitutions, with enough land to start them in life, and 
lived to a good old age. Like all others in those days, he 
drank some spirituous liquor every day, and on receipt of a 
circular from a New England temperance society offering 
him a life membership for twenty dollars, he laughed and 
said that sum would buy whisky enough to last him as long 
as he lived. 

And here I must express my dissent from the opinion of 
some of my most valued and intelligent friends, who think I 
ought to have suppressed or smoothed over his desertion 
from the British army, as if he had done some improper or 
criminal act in so deserting. On the contrary, I consider it 
as not only eminently right and proper, under the circum- 
stances, but perfectly justifiable and highly praiseworthy. 
What were the circumstances? He was a native German, 
kidnapped and forced into the British service, not only with- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 107 



out his consent, but against his will and in violation of his 
most sacred rights, under no earthly obligation, in any legal, 
moral, pecuniary or patriotic sense, to the King of England, 
to whom he owed no allegiance and was not bound to render 
any service; and the fact that more of them did not desert 
was probably because they were in a strange land among 
people speaking a language not understood by them, whom 
the British officers led them to believe would show them no 
quarter. And, as a foreigner to both the British and the 
Americans, he had no more business to interfere in their con- 
test than any individual would have to intermeddle in a quar- 
rel between a man and his wife or his children. And if he 
joined General Green's forces at Bacon's Bridge, near 
Charleston, as some say he claimed to have done, it must 
have been because he regarded ours as a just cause and 
intended to cast his lot with us. This much is certain: 
he had more than ordinary common sense, and was so far 
from being ashamed of his course on that occasion that 
he spoke of it freely, and any disgrace or reflection upon 
his character for that course would attach to my own chil- 
dren, for his daughtej was my wife. As to his drinking, 
it was the universal custom of the country at that time, 
the only exceptions being some of the Methodist preachers, 
whose discipline enjoined total abstinence. The manner of 
his abduction shows the degraded condition of the lower 
classes in Europe a hundred years ago. • 

He once told me that he had made upwards of forty crops 
from his land and never found it too wet or too dry to 
plough. On rainy days when confined to the house, he 
made wagon whips and split bottom chairs, which he sold in 
Lexington village and Columbia. A short time before his 
death he opened a correspondence with his family in the old 
country, which resulted in the immigration of his cousin, 
John Snyder, and his wife and children, with the Mabuses, 
to Lexington in 1832. 



108 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Being a capital blacksmith, Mr. Snyder set to work in the 
village, where his hammer was heard after the rest of us had 
gone to bed and long before we rose in the morning. A 
brisk, active little body, as solid as a knot, he never took 
the pipe from his mouth except to eat or drink. He had be- 
longed to the Prussian army that followed Napoleon into 
France after his defeat at Leipsic, and he told how the Ger- 
man soldiers danced 'Mike de debil " with the French gals 
on the frontier, and how the savage Cossacks ate and slept 
with their horses in the dirt and filth of their stables. • Like 
other Germans of the rural class, his great ambition was to 
become a landholder, which had been beyond his hopes in 
the old country, and he soon made enough in his shop to pur- 
chase a farm, where he took care to raise his supply of smok- 
ing tobacco. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

L EXING TON.—Contimied. 

SOME LEADING MEN OF THE DISTRICT. 

West Caughman, John W. Lee, John Quattlebaum, Daniel Rambo, 
Tommy Williamson, Simon Redmond and John Hoover— Muller 
& Senn — Major Threewits — Old Granbt and Its Inhabitants — 
A Tale of a Shirt, 

West Caughman lived a mile East of the village and had a 
grist and saw mill on Twelve Mile Creek — a stream that, 
though only fifteen or twenty miles long in a direct line, had 
by its rapid and unfailing flow of water probably more mills 
than any other of the same length in the State. He had only a 
scant old field school education, but was blest with a fund of 
plain common sense and undoubted uprightness and integ- 
rity, which made him a leader, a model and a guide, and, 
with his large family connections, caused him to be repeat- 
edly elected to the Legislature, where he was highly respected 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 109 



for his many sterling good qualities. He was very tall and 
thin, and Judge Butler said that while on the Committee of 
Roads, Bridges and Ferries he proposed to abolish all bridges, 
declaring that a well-made man could stride across the streams. 

Colonel John W. Lee of Leesville, eighteen miles above 
Lexington, on the stage road to Augusta, of fine address, free 
and easy speech and manners, liberal and hospitable deport- 
ment, with considerable means, was the most popular man in 
his section. Of his large family of sons, many, with their 
descendants, still live in Lexington, Edgefield and Columbia. 
His daughter Mary, beautiful and accomplished, married 
McMillan, an understrapper of John McLean, and removed 
to Darlington, where, I believe, she still survives. The 
Colonel used to tell of his going once to a sale or muster in a 
broadcloth coat —the only one on the ground — and that first 
one and then another of his neighbors pinched him on the 
shoulder, with the request of a word with him, when they 
one and all dunned him for the money they had loaned him, 
till before the day was over they had pinched a hole on each 
of his shoulders as big as an epaulette, and from that time 
forth he always wore homespun. 

At Hollow Creek were the Caughmans, Crouts, Lominicks, 
Vansants, Robertses and others. Captain John Quattlebaum, 
father of General Paul, lived a few miles South of Leesville, 
where he became celebrated as a maker of rifles that obtained 
a wide reputation and sale in this State, Georgia and North 
Carolina for their fine finish and accurate aim. He was very 
tenacious of his opinions, and rather fond of controversy, 
especially on politics and religion. 

In the neighborhood of John Howard's grog shop were 
Elisha Hammond, father of James H. Hammond, the bril- 
liant lawyer and statesman, who rose to be Congressman and 
Governor; Peter Rowe, who lived to be a hundred years 
old, Jesse Fox, father of my old friend John Fox, afterwards 



110 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 

Sheriff and Clerk for many years, George Steedman, the 
Gants, Gunters, HaHmans and others. The people of this 
neighborhood were very litigious, and when one had a case in 
Court he generally came to the village in a wagon, bringing all 
his family and kin as witnesses, and camping out at night to save 
expenses. Besides, some of them brought ginger cakes and 
cider or spruce beer for sale, and their wagons, with the rear 
end open to expose their wares, filled the Court yard. Squire 
Steedman was sued for slandering Gant and Rankin, in accus- 
ing them of stealing his bull, and the jury gave them a verdict 
of fifteen hundred dollars, which was regarded as a very large 
amount for Lexington. His many sons and grandsons are 
widely scattered and have gained wealth and distinction. 
Some fifteen miles below Howard's, Daniel Rambo dwelt and 
owned mills on the head waters of Edisto River, and I found 
no house, settlement or water course for nearly the whole dis- 
tance. Late in life he moved West, and his son Samuel, 
after going to school at Lexington, married a daughter of A. 
H. Fort, and some years later, when she died, took her sister 
for his second wife. From Rambo's I went to Simon Red- 
mond's, on Bull Swamp, where the neighboring taxpayers, 
the Huttos, old John Hoover and others, met me at night 
and paid their dues to the State, passing by Williamson's 
mills, at the regimental muster ground, owned by Tommy 
Williamson, who furnished food, lodging and whisky to all 
comers, and, drinking all the time, was never exactly drunk 
or sober, but just comfortably boozy. His regular charge 
was a dollar and a half — no more, no less, whether one stayed 
a single night or a week. He always neglected privates for 
officers, and paid attention to each in proportion to his rank. 
Thus, a Lieutenant was treated with marked respect till a 
Captain appeared, then the latter received all notice and re- 
gard until the arrival of a Major, who in turn was ignored for 
the Colonel, and he for the General or the Governor when 
he happened to be present. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. Ill 



Redmond, though very poor, would take no pay for the 
entertainment he furnished me, refusing to let me give a half 
dollar to one of his children, and when I left one on the 
table or the floor he was so scrupulous as to keep i-t till my 
return and tender it back to me. 

Thence twelve or fifteen miles East through an unbroken 
forest of pines, with scarcely any undergrowth, my way led to 
Sandy Run, on the State road, at the store of MuUer & Senn. 
Henry Muller and Rufus Senn, (a lame man,) whose sons, 
bearing the same names, so worthily represent lower Lex- 
ington in Columbia. Here were the Geigers, Bakers, Kaig- 
lers, Saylors and other rich owners of lands on the Congaree. 
A few miles above, on the way to Granby, Major John 
Threewits, an old Revolutionary soldier, lived, a mile or so to 
the West of the road. While serving in the Legislature some 
years previously, he rode to Columbia on horseback every 
morning and hitched his steed to one of the oaks in the 
State House yard, with a bundle of fodder tied on behind 
the saddle. And when the Bank of the State issued one 
dollar bills with a vignette representing the State House, 
some one objected to .the correctness of the picture, because 
it failed to show Major Threewits's horse tied to the tree with 
the fodder on his back. 

OLD GRANBY. 

At Granby the British had a fort in the war of the Revolu- 
tion, and Mr. Cayce's house, that stands on the hill just 
North of the place, shows a hole in its Northern end made 
by a small cannon ball when the fort was besieged, and I 
believe captured by the Americans, towards the close of the 
war. The town being at the head of navigation on the 
Congaree, with a ferry on the road leading to the up country, 
and broad, fertile river swamp lands extending many miles 
below, was a place of considerable business, and some of its 



112 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



merchants made fortunes and lived in good style. Their 
families were well educated and formed a circle of refined 
society, that was at once moral and elevated. Among them 
were the -Balls, Hanes, Arthurs, Fridays, Seibelses and others, 
whose representatives go to make up the present population 
of Columbia and its vicinity. But when the State capital, 
the South Carolina College and the sessions of the Supreme 
Court were established at Columbia, Granby began to de- 
cline. It had always been unhealthy, the superior capital 
and enterprise of the merchants in Columbia in time drew 
trade from the place, and after the removal of the County 
seat to Lexington it became a deserted village; so that in 
1822 but two or three stores remained, those of MuUer & 
Senn and Pou & Seibels (Lewis Pou and Henry Seibels) 
being all that I recollect. When I first collected taxes there in 
1825, General Henry Arthur, Wolf Hane, son of Nicholas 
Hane, a rosy old gentleman, owner of the ferry, Mrs. Eliza- 
beth Bell, Friday Arthur and James Cayce, who kept a 
public house, a mill and blacksmith and coach-making shops, 
were the most prominent reliques of Granby's former pros- 
perity. 

And here I will repeat an anecdote related by John Cald- 
well, which may be called 

A Tale of a Shirt. 

On a fine sunny morning in May, 1806, a gay party of 
young folks, both male and female, assembled at the residence 
of Alexander Bell, Sr., in Granby, to take an excursion on 
horseback some ten miles up the river to the ferry on Saluda, 
then known as Kennerly's, just above which James Kennerly, 
Esq., resided; his dwelling, a roomy, rambling country 
house, being on the East bank of the river, so close to it that 
a heavy body dropped from one of the windows would foil 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 113 



into the water. Among the gentlemen present were John 
Caldwell of Newberry, and John Mayrant of Sumter, both 
then in College, and it was arranged that they, with two of 
the girls, should pass the night and part of the next day at 
Kennerly's, while the rest of the cavalcade, after all had 
enjoyed themselves boating and fishing in the river, were to 
return to Granby at the close of the day. The two colle- 
gians were rivals for the favor of one of the young ladies 
who remained behind when the others had gone back. They 
were dressed' in the tip of the prevailing fashion, but May- 
rant rejoiced in the display of a magnificent ruffled shirt, got 
up in better style and of finer material than usual, so that it 
attracted the attention and excited the applause and admira- 
tion of the fair sex, and, as Caldwell thought, gave its owner 
an advantage that he was not otherwise entitled to. At bed 
time they were put into the same room with several other 
young men who had called to see the belles from Granby, 
and Mayrant, to save his shirt from being rumpled, pulled it 
off and hung it upon a chair. This was observed by Cald- 
well, who, instigated by the demon of mischief and jealousy, 
and counting all means fair in love and war, resolved to put 
the offending garment out of the way. Accordingly, at the 
dead of night, while all the others were asleep, he rose steal- 
thily, and, wrapping the object of his hate around a brick, 
threw it from one of the windows as far as he could into the 
river. Next morning when Mayrant arose his shirt was miss- 
ing, and, after a thorough and fruitless search, he was forced 
to button up his vest and coat, and, leaving an apology to the 
ladies and family for his sudden departure, to order his horse 
and take the road to Columbia, leaving Caldwell in full pos- 
session of the field. Whether he suspected his rival of any 
agency in the mysterious disappearance of the garment was 
not known ; but Caldwell said twenty years afterwards that 
he could never muster up the courage to tell Mayrant what 



lU RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



had become of his shirt. Neither of them succeeded in gain- 
ing the young lady — a Miss Bell — who was first married to a 
Mr. Heron and afterwards to Major Benjamin Hart. 

As already stated, the old court house, after being used as 
a Presbyterian church, in Columbia, became the residence 
of Mr. Kinard. 

James G. Gibbes, whilst manager of the Saluda Factory, 
bought the rest of the old houses in Granby from Captain 
Alexander R. Taylor, for three hundred dollars, and moved 
them to the Factory, where he converted them into dwellings 
and outhouses for the operatives, but he found great difficulty 
in drawing out the wrought nails with which they had been 
built. These had been made before the introduction of cut 
nails, and were hammered out separately on the anvil by the 
blacksmith, and, owing to their roughness, they adhered to 
the wood so as to split the boards and leave Gibbes less profit 
than he had expected from the purchase. 



CHAPTER XX. 

Z EXING TON.— Continued. 

THE DUTCH FORK. 

Lorick's— "My Pally Hurts Me "—Spring Hill— Thomas Boyd, Se- 
nior — LiNDLER AS A BRIDEGROOM — COUNTS'S— HeNRY SmITH AND 

His Muddbrwit— Shealy's— Tom Frick and His Faith —Wise's— 
Spinning Flax. 

From Granby I returned home, and proceeded the next 
week to collect in the Fork, at George Lorick's, Spring Hill, 
(then kept by Thomas L. Veal,) and Colonel Jacob Counts's, 
on the road from Columbia to Newberry, and at Shealy's and 
Fred. Wise's, on Saluda. At Lorick's I met the Shulers, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 115 



Metzes, Huffmans, Leapharts, Loricks, Cooglers and others, 
whose proximity to the Columbia market enhanced the value 
of their lands far beyond what it would have been at a greater 
distance. The Drehers lived on Saluda and generally paid at 
the Court House. As the story was told, two brothers of an 
old Datch family returning from a muster at Lorick's, one 
asked the other: " Vy didn't you vip dat feller what cussed 
you to-day?" "Oh, my pally hurt me," was the answer. 
"But vy didn't yoii vip him ven he cussed you?^^ " 'Cause 
my pally hurt me too." And it became a common saying 
when one's courage failed that he had the stomach ache. 
Among the men noted for their eccentricity at Spring Hill 
was Thomas Boyd, Senior, an Irishman, whose habits were so 
miserly that, though well off, he denied himself and his family 
the common necessaries of life, and hid away his money 
by boring auger holes in large blocks of wood, into which he 
dropped his gold and silver coins, and then, covering them 
with cloth, used them as chairs. After his death upwards of 
seven thousand dollars were found that he had concealed in 
this way and in cracks of the log house that he occupied. 
He was once savagely attacked and disabled for some time by 
a neighbor's bull, and his constant cry was: "Oh, that iver 
I should come ah the way from ould Ireland to be killed by 
Busby's bul,^' the last word being pronounced with the short 
sound, like but. When he recovered, in reply to the remark 
that he had made a narrow escape, he exclaimed: "Hoot, 
mon ! Do ye think I'd come ah the way from ould Ireland 
to be killed by Busby's bul?''' He was an avowed infidel, 
and his reply to David Richardson, his son-in-law, who told 
him that his life had been spared providentially, was: "Nay, 
nay; if Providence had wanted to see a bul fight, he would 
have put the animal on a far stronger mon than I am." His 
son. Captain Tom, always said he didn't care for whisky 
without he could get his belly full. 



ne RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 

At Spring Hill the favorite amusement was throwing long 
bullets or rolling small cannon balls by hand. The leading 
families in the neighborhood were the Riveses, Williamsons, 
Freshleys, Eleazers, Slices, Lindlers, Busbys and others. 

When Colonel Caughman asked one of the Dutch girls to 
dance with him, she replied: "Oh, I can't tance;" and on 
his inquiring why, she said: "I is too shtifT." 

Of one of the Lindlers it was told that after marrying he 
took his wife home and at bed time said to her : '' Now, Petsy, 
you must shleep in dat little room ; me and proder Jake been 
shleepin togedder so long ve can't do bidout." Once, when 
joking with some girls at my house, I asked them what they 
would have done with such a bridegroom, and one of them 
answered venomously: "I'd have shot him." 

At and near Colonel Counts's, among others, were the Sum- 
mers, Fulmers, Sweetenbergs, Major Mathis, Setzlers, Bun- 
dricks and Millers, and they amused themselves by pitching 
dollars, at which some of them were wonderfully proficient. 

Henry Smith, who had married into the Summer family, 
though untaught, was a capital millwright, and among other 
experiments he tried, after using the water in working a mill, 
to carry it back into the pond by buckets, and thus make an 
approach to perpetual motion. He moved from the Fork to 
the Sand Hills and erected a mill on Black Creek, where he 
made money and concealed a considerable sum in silver coin 
at one time under the floor of his dwelling, whence it was 
abstracted, and he was sued for slander by a member of his 
family whom he accused of having stolen it. When in his 
cups he boasted much of his "mudderwit," but it failed to 
secure the treasure beneath his house. 

I met at Shealy's, near Saluda, many of that name, with the 
Mayers, Fricks, Amicks, Ballantines and others. 

I remember old Tom Frick, a regular Lutheran, telling me 
that a young preacher a few days before had said in the pul- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 117 



pit: ''If I were to ask every member of this congregation, 
what is faith? I doubt if one could give the correct answer," 
to which the old man added, "I'll be d — n if I didn't 
know what it was as well as he did !" 

Mr. Wise's mother and his mother-in-law, both very old 
women, lived in his house with him, his wife and a large 
family of children, thus showing three, if not four, genera- 
tions under the same roof, and they all seemed to be quiet 
and peaceful. Here I saw the last flax wheel turned by a 
treadle by the feet of one of the old ladies, and he kept up the 
practice of having one of his children stand by the table and 
ask a blessing before meals. Fred Wise's station was attended 
by the Hylers, Stingleys, Harmons and others. 

Old George Gross, being somewhat deaf, failed one morn- 
ing to hear the petition pronounced by one of his children 
and repeated it himself, whereupon his wife drawled out, 
*'I reckon we'll have grace enough dis toime." At Henry 
Meetze's table, after he had asked a blessing, Adam Summer 
told him, "If I couldn't say a better grace than that, I'll be 
d — n if I didn't quit," and when Henry Summer heard of 
it he said Meetze ought to have kicked Adam out of the 
house. Dr. Lindsay was once invited by some mischievous 
girls at the dinner table to ask a blessing, but he replied that 
where he came from they always saved time by saying grace 
over the beef and pork when they killed it. 



118 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER XXI. 



Amos Banks, the Humorist— Buckeye Bayles— Whitman, the Black- 
smith — Paysinger and Bates — Deep Swimming Dominick and His 
Gun — Drunken Men and Hogs — Nicknames — Verses. 

Amos Banks preceded and succeeded Mr. Haltiwanger as 
Sheriff, and lived in the jail, Squire Fort having removed 
to his new house on the brow of the hill below. Banks was 
an inveterate humorist, whose main object in life seemed to be 
making fun. His face was serious to solemnity even when 
telling and enjoying a joke, enabling him to impose the most 
improbable stories on his hearers as actual facts. He attri- 
buted his slight lameness to his having stolen a bag of shot 
when a youth and concealing it in his breeches pocket, which 
drew him to one side. Being asked the news on his way 
from Columbia during a session of the Legislature, he re- 
ported that two members of the House, whom he named, 
had got into a quarrel and fight in the Representative hall, 
in which their friends joined, and that the Assembly had 
broken up in confusion, the members all going home, without 
passing the bills to raise supplies or make appropriations, and 
that consequently no taxes would be collected the next year. 
Then he left his hearer, who repeated the news to his neigh- 
bors. One night he hired hands to take the wheels from a 
wagon that stood in the street and hang them on the limbs 
of a tree in front of Meetze's store, and then charged the 
act upon West Caughman and James Kennerly, two of the 
most quiet and orderly old citizens in the country round. 

He never saw John Bayles, the well digger, commonly 
called Buckeye, without telling of his fall into Squire Fort's 
Well while digging it. The well was forty or fifty feet deep 
when Buckeye got into the bucket to be let down by the 
windlass, and his assistant who held the handle let it slip, 
precipitating bucket. Buckeye and all to the bottom, he cry- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 119 



ing out as he fell, '' Lord have mercy upon me, and that quick. ' ' 
While he lay there senseless. Fort descended with a rope to 
bring him out, and as he tied it around Bay /es' s neck, he said : 
"Ah, Buckeye, this ought to have been done twenty years 
ago." Then they windlassed him up, and, taking off the 
rope, laid him out on the grass, where he came to in an hour 
or so. Bayles always joined in the laugh at the story, which 
was true as to his fall and recovery. 

Some young men of the village had been stealing chickens, 
which they cooked and eat in the woods at night. Among 
them was a fellow from Edgefield named Whitman, a striker 
in Pardee's blacksmith shop, whom Banks disliked and 
determined to run off. So he arrested Whitman and John 
Drenan on a pretended warrant for petty larceny in stealing 
fowls and lodged them in jail, Drenan understanding that it 
was all a joke. Just before dark he had Jesse Owens to 
hail the prisoners from the outside and tell them that Banks 
was drunk and that he (Owens) would steal the keys and 
i;elease them soon after supper, if they would be ready to 
make their escape. This they agreed to do, and when Owens 
appeared, pulling off their shoes, they crept silently down the 
stairs, which landed in Banks's bed room, where he lay appar- 
ently asleep. But just then he woke up, called on them to 
stop and fired a pistol. They broke for the outer door, and, 
reaching the street, made for the woods, pursued by a dozen 
or more boys whooping and hallooing. Drenan soon 
dropped behind and Whitman was chased quite a distance 
by the boys. Next morning, report said that he had passed 
Leesville in a trot, bareheaded and barefooted, but he never 
returned to Lexington, and Pardee saved the week's wages 
that were due him. 

One story Banks repeated to all comers nearly every day for 
some months. It was to the following effect : Paysinger, a 
hare-lipped man in Newberry, and Jacob Bates, of Edgefield, 



120 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



agreed to make an expedition on horseback to Alabama in 
search for new lands. They went before a Magistrate and 
made oath that, to save expenses on the trip, they would lie 
in no man's house, would pay no more than 12^ cents for 
ferriage, would cook their own victuals and distill their own- 
whisky, carrying with them a pot for a still and a gun barrel 
for the worm. 

Old Mr. Dominick, a neighbor, warned them that ''they 
would get drownded in swimming some of them big rivers," 
but they scouted the idea. Accordingly, setting out with a 
good supply of provisions for themselves and their horses, 
they proceeded to the ferry at Augusta, where twenty-five 
cents each was demanded for crossing. Paysinger, who was 
the leader throughout the expedition, called out " Noo mush ! 
Gum on. Gates," his hare-lip preventing his sounding the B, 
and they rode up the river to a high, perpendicular bank, 
where, adjusting their fixtures, they prepared to jump off into 
the river. This was not easily done, packed up as they were 
with pots, pans, bags of meat, bread and corn, and great 
masses of fodder behind their saddles. When ready. Pay- 
singer took a running start and sailed off into the river, 
where he disappeared a little while, and arose, crying out, 
*'Gumon, Gates." Bates shut his eyes, exclaimed "Oh Lord !" 
and, jumping off, turned over two or three times before striking 
the water, when it opened to the bottom and then closed 
over him for fully five minutes, but at length his nose and 
that of his horse appeared, and he followed in the wake of 
Paysinger, who encouraged him with the remark: *'Mooty 
deep whimmin. Gum on, Gates." On reaching the other side, 
where the shore sloped gradually up, they emerged and slowly 
dragged their loads out on land, like a couple of great 
elephants, the water pouring and dripping from them in every 
direction. Then they unloaded and made a fire, by which 
they dried themselves and their appurtenances before resum- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 131 



ing their journey. In this way they carried out their agree- 
ment faithfully and successfully, till on the way back, at Line 
Creek, which divided Georgia from Alabama, when the pot 
that had hung bottom upwards from Paysinger's saddle 
unfortunately got turned right side up, filled with water, and, 
sinking, dragged him down, encumbered by his fixtures, and 
he was drowned. When the news came, one of Dominick's 
friends called on him and asked: "Well, neighbor, wat you 
dinks?" ''Somedimes I dinks one ding, somedimes anuder." 
*' Paysinger is drowned." ''Well, I dold him ef he swum all 
dem big rivers he'd got drownded." "Where did it hap- 
pen?" "In Lyonse's Creek." "What, dat little pranch?" 
" Py Cot, when she's full she's worse as a pig river." In 
about these words Banks told the story, never cracking a 
smile till he ended, and then breaking out into a long and 
loud laugh at every repetition. 

At a petty muster some young men once played a trick on 
Dominick, by loading his gun with alternate layers of pow- 
der and spunk — a kind of rotten wood that holds fire and 
burns slowly ; then, igniting the upper layer, they started him 
home alone at night, about half drunk, with the gun on his 
shoulder. When he had gone a short distance the fire reached 
the first charge of powder and the gun went off spang. The 
old fellow said, "H'm, tam de olt kun, she neffer sarfed me 
so pefore!" Soon after a second discharge followed, when 
he repeated the same words in a tone of still greater surprise; 
but on the third explosion, he said to the gun, "Are you goin 
to haf a Krishmus in de woods?" And as another and 
another took place, he finally threw her away, exclaiming, 
"Ef you're goin to haf a Krishmus, you may haf it py 
yuself!" On reaching home he called out to his wife, "Olt 
'ooman, my kun is hafin a Krishmus in de woods !" Just then 
the gun went off .f/^z;/^ again, and he said, "Dere, don't you 
hear her ?" He always believed the gun had been bewitched, 
or, as he called it, behexed. 



132 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



A youth of the Croiit family Banks always called collards, 
declaring that his name should be neither krout, cabbage, 
nor kale, because he said, when dining at old Mrs. Grout's 
one day, this boy kept sauntering about till ordered out, and 
it then appeared he had been reconnoitering the dinner table, 
as he was overheard telling the other children in an adjoin- 
ing room, " De meat's all gone, but I reckon dere'll be some 
collards left." 

Certain old topers who kept no spirits at home got dead 
drunk every time they came to the village. Then, as one lay 
in the street. Banks would hire some of the boys to black his 
face and cover him with an empty crate loaded down with 
heavy weights, which, when he woke up, prevented his escape 
from the cage without help, or he would scatter corn around 
the prostrate body and call the hogs to root and roll it over 
and over. 

Once in the street I saw a lot of hogs made drunk by eat- 
ing the cherries left from a barrel of cherry bounce, and 
they staggered, quarreled and fought just like so many 
drunken men. 

Banks was very successful in giving nicknames which 
expressed the characters of the parties and stuck to them. 
Thus, a conceited, visionary old man was "the chaff bag," 
and a stupid, blank-looking fellow he called cuffee, while 
another, with a hook nose and a very harsh voice, was the 
jackdaw. Lexington village he dubbed Pompey town, after 
an old horse that he brought there named Pompey, and the 
name adhered to the place for many years. Getting drunk 
he styled fighting the Devil, and after a night's hard drink- 
ing he would say, "I gave the Devil hell last night." 

A local versifier, who might have been better employed, 
indited the following rhymes on the village and some of its 
celebrities: 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 123 



Oh, Pompey Town, thou art a glorious place, 
Replete with learning, virtue, wit and grace ; 

Thy very air is something more than common — 
Soft, sweet and balmy, like the kiss of woman 

Great men of ancient days here live together. 
Secure from all attacks of wind or weather. 



Here Adamf far from Paradise doth dwell. 

Who understands the game of marbles well ; 
Who plays the fiddle like a man of France, 

And, sooner than deny his friends, will dance ; 
Here Alexander,! famed for many an action. 

Who was almost as brave as General Jackson, 
Remote from wars and tumults, doth reside, 

To cut his neighbor's cloth his greatest pride ; 
Here Amos,f once a prophet staunch and stable, 

Has found the prophet's trade unprofitable. 
And now is daily seen committing evil. 

Telling long tales and fighting with the Devil. 



fMayer. JStewart, the tailor. 1[ Banks. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

LEXING TON— Coiitmued. 

Queer Sayings akd Doings— Lewis Stack as a Plough House— Luke 
Manning— LowRY the Surveyor- Daniel and Jeremy Wingard 
AND Jesse Floyd. 

Then we had other queer sayings and doings that were 
often repeated and will serve in some measure to illustrate 
the character of the people and their times. 

Old Dave Hendrix, while more than half drunk, was found 
fishing intently on dry land from the piazza of Jones's law 
office, and to the question what he was doing, replied, 
"Hush, 'sh, I've jist had a bight." Billy Ann, whilst lying 
before the fire of a winter night, was overheard asking his 
wife Betty Ann "Aint la burnin?" Brink Sellers would 



124 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



never agree that his colt had died for want of breath, and 
swore it was a lie, for he saw him die and the breath was the 
last thing that left him. When old Mr. Lowns's mare died, 
he said *'she nefer sarfed me so pefore." And old Comte, 
the Frenchman, replied, when told that one of his debtors 
had absconded, ''He may go to hell, but I got he note," 
seeming perfectly satisfied by the reflection. A leading 
citizen on one occasion became too drunk to speak distinctly 
and in the confusion of ideas said to some ladies, "You don't 
understand me because I've got wool in my ears." 

The German pronunciation of English words led also to 
many odd double meanings. Thus, old Bowers asked Wood, 
the tailor, to ''gut a goat" for him, but Wood referred him 
to Eph Corley, the butcher, protesting that he had never 
gutted a goat in his life. In breaking a filly to work in har- 
ness, the old man said, " Efery dime she went to make a bull 
she made a bitch." And Squire Addy threatened to ''but 
a pullet troo" the scamp that sent him an abusive anony- 
mous letter. Henry S. reported that his wife had had a 
colt (cold) last week and it almost kilt her, and when I asked 
his father who preached for them now, he replied "the 
circus rider," meaning the rider of the Methodist circuit. 
He once said that the striker in his blacksmith shop had gone 
over the river to look at his wife, instead of to see or to visit her. 
One of the Metzes said of an election, "It was brettydight 
buUin, I dell you." Old George Wingard didn't like tobacco 
that grumbled (crumbled) in his mouth. On the death of a 
friend he remarked that it was not right for good men to die 

while d d rascals lived out their days, and being told that 

it must be right or God wouldn't allow it said with an oath: 
"It may be right, but it ain't fair." The following was told of 
Lewis Stack in the Fork: Having no plough horse one spring, 
he proposed that his wife should hitch him in to pull the 
plough while she held the lines, cautioning heragainst letting 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 125 



him run away on pain of a severe switching. Accordingly, 
he drew one or two furrows across the field, when, taking 
fright at a stump, he broke loose, and, jumping the fence, 
took to the woods, whence he returned with a hickory and 
proceeded to chastise her for letting him go. I once heard 
him asked if the story was true and he made no reply. One 
of our most popular men when at a gathering would take 
out first one friend and then another, twenty yards or more 
from the crowd, and, after looking carefully in every direc- 
tion to make sure that no eavesdropper was in hearing, would 
ask in a low tone, "How is your family?" ''Has the drouth 
hurt your crop much?" and other equally important and con- 
fidential questions. 

Sixty years ago Luke Manning, (Black Luke,) a desperado 
of the worst kind, was the terror of the region bordering on 
Lexington, Newberry and Edgefield, where he had committed 
many outrages and several murders, apparently from pure 
devilment. He was a native of Newberry District, East of 
and near to Saluda River, and at the risk of being tedious I 
will give an account of some of his pranks. Stopping for 
dinner at a house in the upper part of Lexington, where he 
was unknown, he left a written notice, signed "Colonel 
Blood," summoning the head of the family, who was absent, 
to be and appear at Columbia on the ensuing Monday, armed 
and equipped according to law, with a week's provisions,- to 
suppress an outbreak of the Indians in Western Georgia, 
stating that they were massacreing the whites, for whose pro- 
tection the Governor had been called on to send troops from 
South Carolina. 

On a freezing winter morning he was fishing for red horse 
in Saluda at a place that he had baited, exactly opposite to an 
old deaf neighbor of his, who, on the other side of the river, 
was similarly employed. The old man had the better luck, 
and, as he pulled out one fish after another, would hold it up 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



and call out to Luke that he ''didn't know nothin' about 
fishin'." Luke determined on having fish, luck or no luck, 
and, bidding his old friend good morning, he walked down 
below a bend in the river where he kept a canoe, and, getting 
into it, crossed over, cut down a sapling eight or ten feet 
long, leaving a fork at the little end, crept up behind the 
fisherman, who was seated on a steep, slippery bank, and, 
waiting till he had hooked another fish, placed the forked 
stick to the back of his neck, shoved him headlong into the 
water, which was upwards of ten feet deep, and seizing his 
string of fish carried them home, whilst the old man was left 
to save himself if he could. With great difficulty he caught 
to a limb and scrambled out, half drowned and half frozen, 
to find his fish gone and Luke's sapling, which he had hur- 
riedly dropped, in their place. This betrayed him, but 
when charged with the theft and assault he insisted that the 
old man had been pulled in by the fish. 

While a shooting match for beef was going on one Satur- 
day afternoon at the Dead Fall, a low groggery, then kept by 
Colonel Drury Sawyer, on Hollow Creek, Luke rode up in a 
gallop, rifle in hand, singing at the top of his voice: 

" Fourteen pence in the corner of the fence, 
And the Hollow Creek boys hain't got no sense." 

Then, dismounting and tying his horse to a limb, he gave him 
a cut, saying: "He's four years old and trots aready." He 
began by treating all around, taking several chances for the 
match, and proceeded to make himself at home, welcoming 
one with the question : " How's your wife and my children?" 
When another appeared, running and pretending to hide 
behind the house, while he exclaimed: "What have I done 
that the Devil's come?" Asking a third if he was always 
mad when he looked ugly, and making fun at the defects or 
deformities of others, particularly of Colonel Sawyer, a red- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 127 



eyed, nervous little body, who was lame from a dislocation of 
the hip. As the day wore on he continued drinking, and 
grew more and more contentious and disagreeable, and when 
one observed that the Western clouds looked red like blood 
he replied: "Wait till the shank of the evening and I'll 
show you something more like blood by a jugfull, for I feel 
the Devil in me as big as a meeting house." As was not 
uncommon, the match was prolonged into the night, with, 
fires burning at the target and the marksmen's stand. They 
were drinking freely and all more or less intoxicated, when a 
quarrel broke out between Manning and Sawyer, who, irri- 
tated beyond measure at the repeated and unfeeling allusions 
to his crippled limb, finally said to Luke : '' If I was well and 
of your size, you darsent treat me so." This Luke denied, 
and after some further altercation he proposed to putT them 
both upon an equality by fighting a duel then and there with 
their rifles, each to commence loading at the word "Go" 
and to fire when he got ready, adding : "Your pally hurts 
you if you back out from this offer." The other, though a 
peaceable man, was as brave as Julius Csesar, and he accepted 
the challenge. The bystanders meantime ceased their clatter 
on other matters, and, giving their whole attention to the 
two disputants, made some efforts to adjust the difficulty, but 
Manning swore he had come there to kill somebody and he 
would as lief it should be that lame dog as any one else. 
Accordingly the light was replenished, and when the com- 
batants declared themselves ready, both expert riflemen at the 
word began to load, knowing that their lives depended upon 
their expedition. They first poured down the charge of 
powder, to be followed by the ball, which fitted the bore of 
the gun exactly and required some force to push it to its place 
with the ramrod. It happened that Sawyer, in his haste and 
excitement, got his bullet fast soon after it entered the muzzle 
and all his efforts failed to move it. To fire the gun in that 



128 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



condition he knew would cause it to burst, and, while he 
tugged and cursed at the ramrod, Luke, seeing his difficulty, 
finished loading, and, with a whoop, screamed in a loud 

voice: "Now thrapple, and, d n you, I'll send you to 

hell in a minute." Then, dropping his rifle to a horizontal 
position, was in the final act of priming, when one of Saw- 
yer's friends, whose name was never publicly known, throw- 
ing a four pound weight, struck him in the back of his head 
and knocked him senseless to the ground. And thus Luke 
Manning's famous duel ended in his being laid across his 
horse and taken to the house of Jacob Drafts, Sr. 

One night at Mr. Stewart's house, in the village, it was 
reported that Luke had just committed another murder up 
on Saluda. Several young men were present, and ainong 
them was a land surveyor named Lowry, who had been there 
about a week drinking and annoying every one by his 
officious interference in their business and conversation. All 
united in denouncing Manning as a ruffian and an outlaw, 
whom it would be a public service to put out of the way, and 
Lowry, joining in, affirmed that he would give a hundred 
dollars to have such a brute hung. Some of the others had 
raised the report and concocted a scheme to give Lowry a 
fright. One of them soon after came into the room and 
announced that Luke had just arrived and was then in the 
house. Jacob Vansant, a carpenter with big black whiskers, 
personating the dreaded desperado, walked in and inquired 
with a tremendous oath who had been slandering his charac- 
ter? All were silent, but turned towards Lowry, when Van- 
sant, drawing a long knife, made at him, with the exclama- 
tion, "You're the man!" Lowry broke for the street, the 
whole crowd following and hallooing "Catch him!" He first 
ran to Jones's office, back of the court house, praying 
admittance and protection, but before the door was opened 
the pursuers were too close behind, and, not seeing the gate, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



he jumped the fence towards Meetze's tavern, and, while they 
continued the cry just far enough in the rear to keep him at 
the top of his speed, arrived there, was admitted and the door 
safely locked. He thankfully acknowledged his obligations 
to Meetze for saving his life, paid his tavern bill, and, order- 
ing his horse to be ready at daylight next morning, never 
appeared at Lexington again. 

My last sight of Manning was at Lexington, on his return 
from Columbia, in charge of the Sheriff of Edgefield, after 
an unsuccessful effort before the Court of Appeals for a new 

trial from his conviction for the murder of Foutze, 

whom he had waylaid and shot while ploughing in his field. 
It was a cold, drizzly day in December, and he sat shivering 
and handcuffed beside the Sheriff in a little covered wagon, 
wrapped in a scanty plaid cloak, looking to my eyes like a 
famished wolf thirsting for blood. After a long imprison- 
ment he was pardoned and went to Alabama, where report 
said he was finally hanged for another murder. 

Henry Hook's daughter who had been seduced by Judah 
Barrett was married some years afterwards to Daniel Win- 
gard, and her younger sister to Jesse Floyd. The latter was 
a boat builder by trade, and he, with Daniel Wingard and 
his brother Jeremy, went into the business of building and 
running boats to Charleston by way of the Santee Canal. 
The boats were built in pairs to match, so that after taking 
two loads down they were unloaded and one put into the 
other for the trip back. On one of their trips down they 
reported that their boats had accidentally taken fire and been 
destroyed with their loads of cotton. Suspicion was aroused 
and they were accused of burning the boats after taking out 
the cotton, which they hauled to the city by wagon and sold. 
Jeremy was arrested in Charleston, where I saw him in jail, 
and, at his request, consulted his attorney, James B. Camp- 
bell, respecting his case. Daniel came home, and, learning 



130 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



that the Sheriff had a warrant for him, kept out of the way 
for some time, but sent word to the court house that he 
would kill any officer who should attempt to capture him. 
Presuming upon the Sheriff's want of energy for immunity 
from arrest, and as nothing had been done in the case for 
some weeks, he, as it were, in the mere spirit of bravado, 
rode up one afternoon into the court house yard, where a 
number of us were standing, with a double-barreled gun 
across his lap. Some one told Sheriff Harmon of his pres- 
ence, and the warrant was given to his Deputy, Jacob Rail, 
(called gentleman Jacob to distinguish him from a namesake,) 
with orders to execute it. Rail came out, walked up to Win- 
gard and commanded him to surrender. He cocked and pre- 
sented his gun as Rail approached, but the latter never 
swerved or hesitated, and when in reach of the weapon seized 
it by the barrel, and, suddenly twisting it out of VVingard's 
hands, threw him to the ground on his feet, when, without a 
word, he raised and aimed it at his head. Dr. Simmons 
called out, "Shoot the d — n rascal!" but Rail forbore. It 
was all over in less than five minutes, and Wingard was safely 
lodged in jail. 



CHAPTER XXni. 

L EXING TON.— Continued. 

Judges and Lawyers— Judge Gantt, Judge O'Neall— Tom Hendrix 
AND Isaac Vansant — Judge Butler and Barney Livingston — Old 
Grig Clark — Cases in Court — Joseph Kennerly's Widow — Dun- 
ning vs. Permenter, Breach of Marriage Contract— Meetze 
and Singletary, Arson and Forgery. 

While serving as Clerk of Court, I of course became 
acquainted with the law Judges and the members of the bar 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 131 



in our Circuit, which comprised the Districts of Richland, 
Newberry, Orangeburg and Lexington, with some from Edge- 
field who attended our Courts. The Judges were Richard 
Gantt, John S. Richardson, Baylis J. Earle, Josiah J. Evans, 
and part of the time J. B. O'Neall and A. P. Butler; the 
Solicitors, James J. Caldwell, afterwards Chancellor, and F, 
H. Elmore. Judge Gantt, with the kindest heart in the world, 
always leaned to mercy's side and took the part of the 
accused, insomuch that General Caldwell, while going the 
Circuit with him as prosecuting attorney, used to say that he 
kept a tally of the prisoners tried, where he put down all 
acquittals on the Judge's side and all convictions on his own. 
The Judge was, I think, the first public advocate of the 
temperance cause in the State, in which he was followed and 
far outdone by his enthusiastic brother O'Neall, who spoke 
and wrote on the subject ably and eloquently for many years 
on all occasions. Many anecdotes of Judge Gantt's eccen- 
tricity were related, but no one ever doubted his charity for 
all mankind and his especial sympathy for those in want or 
distress. He was extremely afraid of fire, and when holding 
Court in Columbia alyvays lodged on the ground floor for 
easy exit in case of an alarm. Sometimes, to avoid the 
apprehended danger, he stayed at the house of John Smith 
at Smith's Branch. Mr. Smith was a sincere and pious 
Methodist of very simple manners and appearance, but the 
Judge pronounced him "a d'nd swinge cat at prayer." 
Once when a clergyman passed the night at the Judge's 
house, the whole household were called in for family worship, 
and at the minister's request the Judge agreed to lead in 
their devotions. Whilst thus engaged, a little fice dog in the 
room discovered that something unusual was going on and 
commenced sniffing, barking and jumping around the Judge, 
w^ho endeavored by raising his voice to drown the noise made 
by the dog. But it had the contrary effect, and when his 



132 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Honor could stand the annoyance no longer, he suddenly 
changed his tone, and turned to a servant, saying '^ D'n that 
dog, take him out," then resumed and concluded his prayer. 

General O'Neall was a practicing lawyer when I went to 
Lexington. He then represented Newberry in the House of 
Representatives, and as Speaker was distinguished for the 
rapid and correct dispatch of business, having a clear, loud 
voice, a fluent delivery and quick perception, and being one 
of the most rapid pensmen in the State. On the bench, he 
usuall/made up his mind at the outset of a case. In sentencing 
those convicted in the Court of Sessions, he threatened 
them loudly and severely and then generally let them off with 
a light penalty. Tom Hendrix (Hamlet) was once brought 
up before him for being drunk and disturbing the Court, and 
when the Judge asked him what reason he could give against 
being sent to board with the Sheriff, his reply, "May it 
please your Honor, he don't keep a good table," so pleased 
the Judge that he was discharged. Isaac Vansant, the Sheriff, 
swore that he kept a better table than Tom Hamlet ever sot 
down to. 

As Chief Justice, Judge O'Neall presided over the Supreme 
Court for many years, and he was President of the. Greenville 
and Columbia Railroad Company from the beginning to the 
completion of that enterprise. He was a great and good 
man, an honor to the State and District that produced him, 
to whose welfare and advancement all his aims and efforts 
were directed. 

At the close of a Term held by Judge Butler, Barney Liv- 
ingston, with some others, was brought up for disturbing the 
Court while drunk. The Judge lectured each of them 
severely till he came to Barney, whom he dismissed with the 
words, ''Oh, it's you ; you may go!" At this slight, as he 
construed it, the old fellow became very indignant, and when 
Court was over declared that he would have satisfaction, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 133 



when, finding that his Honor had gone up the road to Rail's, 
he took after him with the purpose of calling him to account. 

Once, Grig Clark, an old Revolutionary soldier, appeared 
before Judge Gantt for the same offense, and in answer to the 
question why he should not be punished ? accosted the Judge 
as follows: "Old Buck, I font for you when you was in your 
mammy's arms; I'm one of the old blue hen's chickens; I've 
been where the bullets flew like hailstones." Old Grig lived 
to be near eighty without ever taking a dose of medicine and 
then died by a fall that disjointed his hip. He was temper- 
ate at home, but would stay drunk at the village for a week 
at a time, singing bawdy and patriotic songs of the olden 
time, always keeping a very short pipe in his mouth, and 
ready to strike the biggest man in the State if he hurrahed 
for King George, as the boys sometimes did to tease him. 

One of his songs commenced — 

" Come all you brave Virginians, I'll have you now to know, 
That to assist the Bostonians you must prepare to go ; 
The King he has fell out with us, and wants to make us slaves ; 
Before that we'll agree to that, we'll first use our graves. 
As to our noble Governor, he's acted very mean. 
He's no friend to America, it's plainly to be seen ; 
I hear he's robbed the magazine of powder, and he's fled, 
And if he don't return it, he'll surely lose his head." 

Some cases in Court while I was Clerk deserve mention. 

Joseph Kennerly, in the Fork, married a grass widow 
Piatt, and after his death his heirs contested her right of 
dower on the ground that Piatt was living when her marriage 
with deceased took place. In reply, she averred that she 
never was the lawful wife of Piatt, because at the time of her 
alleged marriage to him she had a former husband alive, who 
died previous to her connection with Kennerly. Her maiden 
name was Stewart, and when the case came on for trial she 
was the wife of a stout man named Jenkins, who looked as if 
he might be her last husband. 



134 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



The case of Mary Dunning against Evans Permenter, for 
breach of marriage contract, was brought by Major O' Han- 
Ion, but before trial he swapped it with Caldwell & Jones for 
one brought by them against Wolf Hane for assault and bat- 
tery. This exchange was effected, of course, by consent of 
the respective plaintiffs. Mary Dunning, a tall, stoop- 
shouldered Yankee old maid, who had lost about half of her 
teeth, was a housekeeper for William Baughman, who took 
boarders at Piatt Springs, where a flourishing academy, estab- 
lished by Abram Geiger, had existed for many years. Per- 
menter, the defendant, had been thrice married when the 
contract was alleged to have been made and before the trial 
had taken a fourth wife, who was then dead. He was bald 
on the top of the head, pot-bellied and bandy-legged, with a 
short, stout body, and broad patches of red whisker on each 
cheek. And he seemed completely dumbfounded as Cald- 
well dilated upon his power of fascinating the fair sex, styling 
him a ''gallant, gay Lothario," who went about the country 
engaging the affections of tender and susceptible females and 
then breaking their hearts by desertion without cause. He 
closed by stating that defendant had had one, two — yea, 
three, four — wives, and was then ready for the fifth, and called 
upon the jury to curb this raging lion, or at least draw his 
teeth, by finding a heavy verdict for the plaintiff. The con- 
trast between the man's appearance and Caldwell's descrip- 
tion of him was striking and ludicrous beyond measure. 
Judge Richardson, who presided, charged the jury strongly 
against him, but they decided in his favor, and Caldwell got 
no fee for his services. Major O'Hanlon obtained a verdict 
of five hundred dollars damages against Hane, of which he 
retained one half. 

The cases of Meetze and Singletary excited great interest 
in Columbia and Lexington. Jacob Meetze was keeping a 
large stock of general merchandise at Dial's, corner of Main 



RANDOM RECOI.LECTIONS. 135 

and Camden streets, in Columbia, with an insurance for ten 
thousand dollars in a Charleston company, when his store 
took fire soon after closing at night and was destroyed, with 
most of the goods. Jesse Drafts bought cotton at the store 
and Singletary was Meetze's clerk. Soon after the fire, 
Meetze, with the assistance of Drafts and Singletary, made a 
claim for the amount insured and was paid in full. He then 
went to Charleston, leaving Singletary in charge of his 
accounts for collection. Some months later Singletary sold 
at a large discount to Henry Drafts, at Lexington, (a brother 
of Jesse,) a note on Meetze for two hundred dollars, payable 
thirty days after date at the Commercial Bank of Columbia, 
stating that he was about to depart for the far West. Henry 
Drafts took the note to Columbia next day and showed it to 
his brother Jesse, who pronounced it a forgery, and made 
oath before a Magistrate that, from the handwriting and other 
circumstances, he believed, and had good reason to believe, 
the paper to be forged by Singletary. A warrant was issued, 
and when the accused had been lodged in jail he sent for a 
Justice of the Peace and swore that Meetze had burnt his 
store and given him the note to keep the secret. On this 
Meetze was arrested in Charleston, brought to Columbia and 
put in the same jail with Singletary. The latter was tried at 
Lexington for forgery and the former for arson at Columbia. 
Colonel Elmore, the Solicitor, declined acting in either case, 
because of the awkward and inconsistent position in which 
he would be placed, and Singletary, with the aid of the 
insurance company, employed Blanding and DeSaussure of 
Columbia, with A. P. Butler of Edgefield, (afterwards Judge,) 
while Meetze was represented by Colonel Gregg, Colonel 
Preston and Captain Tradewell. The genuineness of 
Meetze's signature to the note and the origin of the fire were 
the main issues. The ability of the counsel, the conse- 
quences of a conviction to their clients, which elicited unusual 



136 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



efforts, and Meetze's numerous and respectable family con- 
nections, all conspired to heighten the public agitation. Sin- 
gletary was first tried and acquitted. Many and conflicting 
witnesses were examined as to the integrity of the signature, 
and while the preponderance in numbers and means of 
judging were against it, the uncertainty of all testimony on 
such a point was clearly shown, for very confident opinions 
were expressed on both sides by men equally intelligent, con- 
scientious and disinterested. In Meetze's case all depended 
upon the testimony of Singletary, who testified, positively 
and circumstantially, that shortly before the fire Meetze had 
bought a keg of tar and placed it under the counter; that 
when the alarm of fire was made the floor was found covered 
with the tar, which had been poured out and ignited, making 
a broad, bright blaze that soon filled the apartment and con- 
sumed the building with its contents. To meet this state- 
ment, the defense first proved that Singletary had been gam- 
bling with Meetze's money, and once, while playing with 
Frank McCully, had reached across the table and stolen the 
stakes. In disproof of the story as to the origin of the fire, 
a keg of tar was brought into the Court room, and all efforts 
to set it on fire proved that tar cannot be made to burn until 
heated to the boiling point — a fact that was not generally 
known, and certainly not to Singletary, or he would have told 
a different tale. The jury returned a verdict of ''not 
guilty" in a very few minutes, and Singletary departed from 
Columbia never to return. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 137 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



Lafayette's Visit to Columbia — Death of Jefferson and Adams — 
Nullification Convention — John Randolph, Henry Clay and 
Thomas Ritchie— Florida War— Kibler, Sims and Petigru— 
Lutheran Seminary — Dr. Hazelius. 

General Lafayette visited the State in 1825, and by order 
of Governor Richard I. Manning a squadron of cavalry met 
him at the North Carolina line and escorted him to the capi- 
tal, where a grand public dinner, in the basement of the State 
House, was given in his honor, and he was quartered during 
his stay with Isaac Randolph on the North side of Gervais 
street, East of Main. Old Billy Miller, a true soldier in the 
Revolution, who lived in the sand hills and always got drunk 
when he came to Columbia, was dressed up in a decent suit, 
and, among others, introduced to the General, who kindly 
inquired as to the state of his health, and, being told that it 
was very poor indeed, misunderstood the answer, and re- 
joined : "I am very 'appy to 'ear it. Monsieur Millare." 

DEATH OF JEFFERSON AND ADAMS. 

On the Fourth of July, 1826, Rev. Thomas Rail officiated 
at the anniversary celebration in Lexington and gave out the 
very appropriate Methodist hymn beginning — 

" Blow ye the trumpet blow, 
The gladly solemn sound ; 
Let all the nations know. 

To earth's remotest bounds. 
The year of jubilee is come," etc. 

The almost miraculous event occurred that day of the 
death of Jefferson and Adams, exactly fifty years from the 
promulgation of the Declaration of Independence — the first 
named being its author, and the other one of the most 
decided and distinguished advocates of its adoption. The 



138 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



chances were upwards of eighteen thousand to one in favor 
of the death of either of them on any other day of the half 
century, and that both should die then added incalculably to 
the odds. In connection with Mr. Jefferson's death, his 
granddaughter, Mrs. Randolph, relates the following anec- 
dote: A near neighbor and great admirer of his, knowing 
that he was failing rapidly, prayed that he might be spared 
till the Fourth of July, and rejoiced heartily on learning that 
he had crowned his earthly career by dying on that day. 
When it was reported, soon after, that John Adams had also 
departed on the same day, he regarded it as detracting from 
the fame of the sage of Monticello and swore it was a lie. 
But on the fact being established, he pronounced it a " d'nd 
Yankee trick on the part of Adams." 

NULLIFICATION. 

The Nullification Convention that met at Columbia in 
November, 1832, brought together as great an array of talent 
and patriotism as ever was assembled in the State. James 
Hamilton, Jr., then Governor, presided, and among its mem- 
bers were William Harper, Robert Y. Hayne, George McDuftie, 
Robert J. Turnbull, Job Johnston, F. H. Wardlaw, Armi- 
stead Burt, Stephen D. Miller, John Lide Wilson, Daniel E. 
Huger, John B. O'Neall, C. J. Colcock, John S. Richardson, 
R. W. Barnwell, R. Barnwell Rhett, Benjamin F. Perry, ex- 
Governor Richard I. Manning, and F. H. Elmore. Its pro- 
ceedings were also approved by Mr. Calhoun, Colonel Preston 
and Governor Hammond, the two last named attending and 
taking part in the caucus discussions of the NuUifiers as to 
the measures that were adopted. 

These were an ordinance declaring the tariff law of July, 
1832, unconstitutional, null and void, and directing and 
authorizing the Legislature to provide the means for prohibit- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 139 



ing its enforcement within the State after the ist of March, 
1833; at the same time announcing that South Carolina 
would secede from the Union if any attempt should be 
made to use force in carrying out the law, but signifying her 
willingness to submit to the decision of a convention of all 
the States. The General Government was then practically 
out of debt, and a few years later distributed among the 
several States a surplus of many millions, collected, not for 
revenue, but mainly and avowedly for protection. As one 
of the original framers of the Constitution which gave the 
General Government all its powers and defined their limita- 
tions, the State claimed the right to decide when that instru- 
ment was violated, and, in case of a deliberate, palpable 
and dangerous infraction thereof, to interpose, in her sover- 
eign capacity, for the correction of the evil and the protection 
of her citizens from its consequences, or to peaceably with- 
draw from a Union that failed to observe the conditions and 
subserve the purposes for which it had been created. President 
Jackson, on the other hand, issued an address and proclama- 
tion denying that the States ever were separate or sovereign ; 
asserting the supremacy of the Federal Government, and 
threatening to enforce the law by military power, if necessary; 
whilst Congress enacted the Force Bill, empowering him to 
coerce the State into submission. This proclamation he 
afterwards authorized the Richmond Enquirer to explain, 
modify or qualify so as to show that he meant not what he 
had said but something different. 

In response, Governor Hayne's proclamation (one of the 
most eloquent and powerful State papers ever issued) defied 
him to execute his threats and commanded all good citizens 
to sustain the State, to whom their allegiance was due, on 
pain of the penalties for treason. The condition of affairs 
was for some time extremely critical. But the firm stand 
taken by the State effected the passage of Mr. Clay's com- 



140 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



promise Act, reducing the duties on all imports in a course 
of years to the wiiforni rate of 20 per cent., which was 
regarded as a fair revenue standard. Before the expiration 
of the prescribed time this compromise was violated, and 
the tariff question has ever since been the subject of debate 
and dissension. Although the stern and irrevocable arbitra- 
ment of war has since annihilated State rights and established 
the paramount authority of the National Government, yet 
the reports and addresses of the convention deserve the care- 
ful perusal and study of young politicians, for they contain a 
fund of useful and instructive information on the tariff and 
on the origin and character of the General Government not 
to be found elsewhere, and not inapplicable to the condition 
of our country as it is now and may be in the future. They 
are perfect models of a style both pure and forcible. After 
all was over. Governor Hamilton declared that South Caro- 
lina had come out of the contest "armed cap a pie and not 
a feather quivering in her plume." On looking over a list of 
the delegates, I recognize but two besides myself as surviving, 
Rev. Peter J. Shand and ex-Governor B. F. Perry. 

I was informed, confidentially, some years after, that 
Governor Hayne had made arrangements, if a blow had been 
struck at the State, to kidnap General Jackson at Washington 
and bring him a prisoner to South Carolina, where he was to 
be held as a hostage, in the belief that Vice-President Van 
Buren had neither the nerve nor the influence to carry on a 
war, and that a compromise would be made or the State be 
allowed to secede peaceably. 

This information I have never mentioned till now, when, 
after the lapse of half a century, the Statute of Limitation 
seems to warrant its publication, as showing the extremity to 
which w^e were prepared to go in vindication of our rights. 

Now as to other matters. The duel between Henry Clay 
and John Randolph was not solely on account of Randolph's 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 141 



Strictures on Clay's support of Adams for the Presidency, in 
which he called it a union of the Puritan and the blackleg 
and compared them to Black George and Blifil in Fielding's 
novel of Tom Jones. Randolph assailed Clay's personal in- 
tegrity, accusing him of trickery whilst acting as Speaker of 
the House. He stated in one of his discursive harangues in 
the Senate, that, on the passage of a certain bill in the House 
which he had opposed, he inquired of the Speaker whether a 
motion to reconsider would be in order and received the an- 
swer, "Certainly, the gentleman from Virginia knows that 
he has the right to make such motion ;" that it being late at 
night he proposed making the motion next day. That he 
learnt by some means of the Speaker's intention to send the 
bill immediately to the Senate, where on the morrow the 
clock was to be put forward half an hour and the Bill pre- 
sented and passed before the meeting of the House, thus pre- 
venting him from making the proposed motion to reconsider. 
He said that early next morning he took Mr. John Gaillard, 
President pro tern, of the Senate, into a Committee room, 
informed him what was intended, and that they remained 
there till the regular hour for the meeting of the Senate, thus 
precluding Mr. Clay from making the excuse that the Senate 
had acted upon the bill and the motion to reconsider came 
too late. In the duel Randolph received Clay's fire, but 
failed to return it, saying afterwards that he would not have 
killed him for all the land upon the king of rivers. Clay's 
ball passed through the skirt of his adversary's gown, and 
being told by the latter that he owed him a new coat, 
replied, '' I am glad that I am no deeper in your debt." 

Randolph said of Thomas Ritchie, editor of the Rich- 
mond Enquirer: ''He is always harping on principles; he is 
a man of principles; of seven principles — five loaves and two 
fishes." He sided with the NuUifiers in 1832 and 1833, and 
denounced the doctrines of Mr. Jackson's proclamation, as 



143 RANDOM RECOLLECTION^ S. 



he called it, in scathing terms at a public meeting in Vir- 
ginia. 

FLORIDA WAR. 

On the breaking out of the Florida War the regiment 
commanded by Colonel Caughman was ordered to meet at 
Williamson's to raise a company for the campaign. It was 
bitter cold weather in February, 1836, the mill ponds being 
frozen over. An old fellow named Clark, who was half 
drunk, had charge of the house when I arrived the evening 
before the parade. He walked to the door, calling Jack, 
Tom, Jim and others, and when they failed to appear went 
himself to the yard and brought in the wood for a blazing 
fire that was soon burning on the big hearth that nearly filled 
one end of the building. He continued drinking till the 
morning of the third day, occasionally singing a verse or two 
of a song that had been very popular during the War of 1812, 
with the refrain : 

"A soldier is a gentleman ; 

His honor is his life, 

And he that won't stand by his post 

Shall ne'er lie by his wiefe — 

Shall ne'er lie by his wife." 

And he then joined the company on the way to Orangeburg 
as a volunteer. 

At night the camp fires of the militia lit up the woods in 
every direction from the hill on which Williamson's house 
stood. After supper, seeing there were more guests than bed 
room, I asked Tommy Williamson where I was to sleep and 
was pointed to a comfortable-looking bed. Soon after his 
wife came in and I overheard her protesting against giving up 
her bed, but he assured her that she and the children could 
get along very well by the fire in the kitchen. Discovering 
that her bed had been promised me, I told him that I would 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 143 



lie out of doors sooner than his wife and her little ones 
should be exposed to the weather, and made my way into the 
middle room, where I got into a bed between two of my 
acquaintances. But he soon gave his wife's bed to somebody 
else, and she and her family were turned into the kitchen. A 
number of old topers, who sat up all night drinking by the 
fire in the big room, kept me awake most of the time. Among 
them Jim Calk, from Lexington village, was just drunk enough 
to be talkative. He would declare: " Now, gentlemen, listen 
to me. Ef I do go, I'll kill some Indian or some, nigger or 
some mean white man, just as sure as I pass this liquor from 
my left hand to my right and then drink it. Ef I don't, 
I wish I may be dn'ed, and that's as good as ef I had sworn 
it." This he repeated many times, and next morning he was 
among the first that applied to the surgeon for an exemption, 
showing a scar on one of his legs, but the doctor said he saw 
nothing amiss with the leg except that it wanted washing. 
Just before day old Barney Livingston came in from the camp, 
whooping and swearing that he was the best man on Tommy 
Williamson's mill hill, and could lick any one that ever had 
the measles as quick as hell could scorch a feather. The com- 
pany was easily made up of volunteers and two members 
offered for the Captaincy — Joe Lee and Paul Quattlebaum, 
Lee offering to go if elected, and Quattlebaum declaring that 
he would go, elected or not. The latter was chosen, and 
they spent several months in Florida, most of the time in 
a stockade at Volusia, without seeing the Indians, except 
once, when they made an attack upon the post in open day, 
but the coolness and courage of Captain Quattlebaum and 
others, who deliberately fired their rifles at the invaders, soon 
put them to flight. 

Whilst living in Lexington I accidentally had something to 
do on the same day with two distinguished men in Charles- 
ton. On my way there for the purchase of goods I overtook 
John Kibler, a merchant in upper Dutch Fork, a few miles 



144 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



from the city. He was on horseback, accompanied by a 
couple of wagons loaded with cotton, and we rode on to 
Charleston together, where I saw him no more. But when 
starting home, three or four mornings after, I met him in the 
suburbs going back, and he told me that he had lost three 
hundred dollars the day before. That after selling his cotton 
and buying some goods, he had left Charleston with his 
wagons, having the amount named above in new twenty dollar 
bills of the Planters' and Mechanics' Bank, which he had put 
into a pocketbook containing a number of papers. Near the 
Six Mile House he had left the wagons and rode on ahead, 
dismounted at the house, gone in and got a drink, then led 
his horse to the middle of the road, where he took out the 
pocketbook, and, seeing nothing of the wagons, remounted 
and started down the road to meet them. After going some 
two hundred yards he missed the pocketbook and turned to 
go- where he had taken it from his pocket, when he met a 
Mrs. Blackman riding in a gig driven by a negro boy. When 
in speaking distance she called him by name and said : "You 
are looking for your pocketbook; here it is. I found it in 
the road and your papers are scattered about on the ground." 
Upon his asking for the money, she replied that there was 
none in it, and, handing it to him, drove on towards the 
city. Mrs. Blackman was a respectable lady, whose husband 
kept the Twenty-nine Mile House, a well known place of 
public entertainment, where I had often stopped and been 
well treated. Kibler suspected her of taking the money, and 
at his request I returned with him to the city, where we 
applied for a warrant to William Gilmore Simms, who was then 
a young lawyer acting as a Magistrate and having an office 
high up on the East side of King street. After hearing Kib- 
ler's statement he gave us a note to Mr. Petigru, Attorney 
General, inquiring as to his duty in the premises. We found 
Mr. Petigru at his house, and he directed Simms to issue 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 145 



the warrant on Kibler's making the proper affidavit. Tiiis 
was done, and when we found a Constable to make the 
arrest I left Kibler, not wishing to take any further part in 
the matter. Mrs. Biackman was brought before the Justice, 
where she stated that before finding the pocketbook two 
men had crossed the road at that point. No money like 
Kibler's was found in her possession, and she was of course 
discharged. Kibler's neighbors said that he was in embar- 
rassed circumstances and they suspected him of inventing the 
story to avoid the payment of his debts. What the real facts 
were I never knew, except that he was quite drunk when the 
affair took place. On our way home next day, when near 
Blackman's house, we discovered him and two or three others 
in a yard with guns in their hands and I expected a bloody 
row, but they had heard nothing from the city and were 
merely preparing for a hunt, so that we passed in peace. 

The establishment of the Lutheran Seminary brought Rev. 
Ernest L. Hazelius from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to Lex- 
ington as its President, he having presided over a similar 
institution at the former place. A thoroughly educated Prus- 
sian, he had all the simplicity of a child as to worldly things, 
united with most open, unassuming manners and kindly 
disposition. What was strange for a German, he could neither 
sing nor smoke. Of all the men that I have known, but 
three or four seemed to be without fault. Dr. Hazelius, West 
Caughman, Rev. W. A. Gamewell and Rev. Thomas Rail, in 
my judgment, came as near perfection as human nature ever 
attains. 



146 KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

RETURN TO COLUMBIA. 

Officers and Directors of the Commercial Bank— The Branch 
Bank — New Merchants and Men of Business — The Clergy, the 
College, the Academies, the Seminary — Receipts of Cotton — 
Election in 1840. 

Notwithstanding the kindness and favor tliat I had received 
at Lexington, I resolved on returning to Columbia, as afford- 
ing me a wider field and one more suited to my taste. So, on 
the ist of January, 1839, I went into the Commercial Bank 
as Teller, on a salary of ^1,500, leaving my family at Lexing- 
ton till the next winter, and riding back and forth two or 
three times every week. And I added to this income by 
keeping books when not engaged in the bank, being em- 
ployed among others by Mr. DuBose, State Treasurer, to 
post and balance the accounts in his office, and some years 
later all my spare time was occupied quite profitably in the 
propagation and sale of fruit trees. Thus I kept out of debt 
and increased my capital regularly, which very few salaried 
officers ever do. 

My removal to Columbia was against the wishes of all my 
friends at Lexington, but I never had cause to regret it. The 
place in the bank suited me exactly, and the horseback exer- 
cise completely restored my health, which had been seriously 
impaired by dyspepsia. It made me intimate and lifelong 
friends among the officers, Directors and customers of the 
institution, and with the exception of one of the officers I 
never had a quarrel or disagreement with any of them during 
my thirteen years as Teller and thirteen more as Cashier. 

The officers were John A. Crawford, President; Andrew 
McLauchlin, Cashier, and B. D. Boyd, Bookkeeper, with 
Wm. P. Butler, who had been elected Discount Clerk when 
I was made Teller. For Directors we had Andrew Wallace, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 147 



John Bryce, David Evvart, Wm. F. DeSaussiire, Wm. Law, 
Richard O'Neale, Judge David Johnson, Wm. Gregg, Dr. 
Thomas Wells, James L. Clark, G. T. Snowden and Alex. 
Kirk, followed by Isaac S. Cohen, James S. Guignard, Rev. 
Peter J. Shand, Robert Latta, John I. Gracey and others. 
In the Branch Bank Colonel R. G. Goodwyn was Presi- 
dent; D. J. McCord, Cashier; James L. Clark, Teller; Rev. 
Robert Henry, Notary ; John Fisher, Bookkeeper, and Nat. 
Ramsay, Discount Clerk. 

In place of the merchants and business men that I had 
known, a set of new comers were in Columbia. x\mong them 
were Mr. O'Neale, Law & Ellison, Mr. Snowden, J. & R. 
Caldwell, I. S. Cohen, the Cozenses, B. L. McLauchlin, 
Bernard Reilly, James and Robert Cathcart, Chambers & 
Campbell, Frank and John McCuUy, G. M. Thompson, 
Andrew, Daniel and Matthew Crawford, A. C. Squier, the 
Kennedys, Charles Neuffer, Alex. Marks, J. M. Blakeley, 
Amzi Neely, Jaaies Fenton, Kinsler & McGregor, Manuel 
Friday, Felix Meetze, Eaton «& Anderson, Rice Dulin, J. B. 
Ulm, N. B. Hill, John H. Heise, I. D. Mordecai, O. Z. 
Bates, P. H. Flanigan wjth his brothers Dick and Tom, J. S. 
McMahon, John I. Gracey, John Veal, T. J. Radcliffe, Wm. 
Glaze and others. Pat Flanigan once claimed kin with Judge 
O'Neall, and, being asked how they were related, replied, 
jocularly, that he had come within a fortnight of marrying 
the Judge's niece. 

Thomas Davis, the bricklayer, and Charles Beck, carpen- 
ter, both made large fortunes, and John Loomis, 

Wheeler and Eli Killian had started a steam mill for dressing 
lumber. Nat Pope, the butcher, fed most of the people — 
many of them at his own expense, as they failed to pay him 
for the meat they eat. 

Of the clergy, I recollect Revs. P. J. Shand, George Howe, 
A. W. Leland, J. H. Thornwell, Wm. Martin, Nicholas 
Talley, Father Bermingham and the O'Connells. In the 



148 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



College were Messrs. R. W. Barnwell, President, Rev. Dr. 
Stephen Elliott, Chaplain and Professor of the Evidences of 
Christianity and Sacred Literature, while Dr. Thornwell had 
the Professorship of Logic and Belles Lettres, rendered vacant 
by the death of Professor Nott, which he resigned in May, 
1839, to take effect at the close of the year, with a view to 
accept the pastorship of the Presbyterian Church in Colum- 
bia. In this charge, however, he remained but a single 
twelve months, when he was recalled to the College as Chap- 
lain and Professor of Sacred Literature and the Evidences of 
Christianity, on the election of Dr. Elliott as Bishop of the 
Diocese of Georgia. Li the medical profession Drs. H. H. 
Toland and R. W. Gibbes were new comers. Dr. Marks's 
Female Institute at Barhamville was in a very flourishing con- 
dition, and he built, rented and sold houses on the hills 
around. The Columbia Male Academy was in charge of 
James M. Daniel, and the Female Academy in that of Wash- 
ington Muller. The Presbyterian Seminary had been estab- 
lished whilst T was at Lexington, Mr. Ewart and Mr. Beck 
giving ten thousand dollars each, and Mrs. Agnes Law five 
thousand towards its establishment. 

Of all those above named, with the clerks- and assistants 
they employed, but few remain at the end of forty five years, 
the clergy showing the best record in that respect out of 
their limited number — Mr. Shand and Mr. Martin being still 
spared. Not a lawyer or doctor survives. The only others 
that I can recall are Mr. Squier, Mr. Levy, Captain Stanley, 
Mr. Agnew, Mr. Chambers, Mr. McGregor, Mr. Bates, Mr. 
Pope and Mr. Blakely. 

How truly may I say while walking our streets — 

*' When I remember all 

The friends so linked together 
I've seen around me fall 

Like leaves in wintry weather, 
I feel like one 
Who treads alone 
Some banquet hall deserted." 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 149 



Ainsley Hall's store and dwelling had been converted into 
a hotel kept by Colonel William Rice, of Union, and after- 
wards by Davis Caldwell. Mrs. Gandy had a boarding house 
up town that was well patronized, and Dr. Roach had another 
on Plain street, just West of Assembly. Colonel A. H. 
Gladden married Mrs. Gaudy's daughter Mary. 

The receipts of cotton, which reached a hundred and 
twenty thousand bales one year, and the live stock from Ken- 
tucky and Tennessee, made Columbia a lively place in the 
winter and employed all the banking capital, amounting, 
after the opening of the Exchange Bank, to two and a half 
millions. The present capital employed here in banking is 
less than one-tenth of that amount. I have seen Main street 
so crowded with wagons from the site of the present post- 
office to Butcher Town as to be almost impassable for car- 
riages or gigs. Cotton Town was built up by the traffic in 
that staple with large grocery, provisions and storage estab- 
lishments, which did a very extensive and profitable business 
till the completion of the up country railroads, contrary to our 
expectations, transferred this trade from Columbia to the 
towns and villages abovfe. Thus our municipal and indi- 
vidual subscriptions to the stock of these roads, instead of 
benefiting Columbia, deprived her for a time of the main 
source of her prosperity and left her dependent upon the 
immediate neighborhood for support. This result was fore- 
told by but two of our citizens — John A. Crawford and 
Stephen C. DeBruhl — who publicly opposed the subscrip- 
tions, and the latter afterwards boasted that they were the 
only sensible men in Columbia. But the spirit of progress 
was abroad in the land then and all opposition to its course 
proved useless. 

Mr. DeBruhl and Dr. Fitch were next door neighbors, on 
the North side of Gervais street, near Mr. Agnew's present 
residence. A tree that the Doctor wanted out of the way 



150 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Stood on DeBruhl's side of the pavement, and, as they were 
not on good terms, he knew it would be useless to make a 
direct proposition for its removal. So he got a friend to tell 
DeBruhl that Fitch threatened to indict him if he cut it 
down. He immediately called one of his negroes to bring 
his axe, and after the tree was laid low received the informa- 
tion that, contrary to his intention, he had fulfilled his neigh- 
bor's wishes, 

THE ELECTION OF 1840. 

This was more excited and exciting than any other that 
had occurred in Richland. It turned upon the financial 
policy of President Van Buren's sub-treasury scheme of 
severing all connection between the Government and the 
banks. After Jackson removed the public deposits from the 
United States Bank, he caused them to be placed in certain 
selected State banks. These, to sustain the popularity of 
the President's policy, made unsafe and injudicious loans and 
investments, inflating the currency so as to produce a suspen- 
sion of specie payments and widespread panic throughout 
the country in 1837. Van Buren then recommended the sub- 
treasury and its branches, where the public funds should be 
kept, while the Whig party, led by Mr. Clay, urged the 
recharter of the United States Bank to manage the finances 
of the Government. Mr. Calhoun had acted with the Whigs 
in opposing Jackson's course as to the United States Bank 
and the pet State banks, and Van Buren was so odious in 
South Carolina, from the belief in his intriguing and corrupt 
practices, that no measure proposed by him could get a fair 
hearing. Great was the surprise, therefore, when Mr. Cal- 
houn was reported as approving the sub-treasury plan, and 
some of his friends called the report a slander upon his char- 
acter. It proved true, however, and caused a wide division 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 151 



among our politicians and people, while showing Mr. Cal- 
houn's independence of opinions at home, and that he was 
not a follower but a leader on great public questions. 

Colonel Elmore, our Representative in Congress, after care- 
fully feeling his way, concluded to follow the lead of Mr. 
Calhoun; while Colonel Preston, Mr. Calhoun's colleague in 
the Senate, adhered to Mr. Clay and his party. Richland 
and her leading men were about equally divided: On one 
side were the Elmores, F. H. and B. T. , the Taylors, 
Colonels James and Maxcy Gregg, Colonel Goodwyn, Major 
Stark, Dr. LaBorde, William M. Myers, W. W. Eaton, John 
C. Thornton, Jesse DeBruhl and others. On the other the 
Prestons and Hamptons, Colonel McCord, General Adams 
and the rest of the Adamses, ex-Governor Butler, Captain 
Tradewell, Mr. Boatwright, Mr. Ewart, Dr. Sill and Captain 
Bookter, (Old Thermopylae.) For two or three weeks before 
the election both parties assembled at beat of drum soon 
after dark, and, parading Main street with great noise, were 
joined by their respective followers and marched to their 
headquarters— the Democrats to Coleman's Theatre, gene- 
rally headed by Bill Myers; and the Whigs, under the lead 
of Governor Butler, to Beckham's Carolina Hall, up stairs, 
near where Palmer's tin shop now is, each party keeping its 
own side of the street to prevent a collision. There they 
were addressed in the most exciting and inflammatory lan- 
guage, which was applauded in proportion to its bitterness. 
The Democrats, to intimidate their opponents, brought from 
abroad a set of roughs, low, dirty-looking ruffians, who wore 
red caps and were apparently ready for any act of violence. 
They also invited to their aid the passionate eloquence of 
McDuffie, who made a bitter and savage personal attack on 
Colonel Preston. The Whigs on their part had a grand 
demonstration and barbecue in Taylor Town, where speeches 
were made by Preston, Legare and Waddy Thompson. An 



152 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



idea'of the existing feeling may be gathered from the fact 
that when Mr. John A. Crawford proposed to Colonel Good- 
wyn an arrangement or understanding for each party to go 
to the polls by turns, in order to prevent an outbreak, the 
Colonel rejected the proposition with the remark that the 
sooner an outbreak came the better, to which Crawford 
replied, " If it comes to that, you are my man." And they 
were not hot-headed youths, but both beyond middle age. 
The sand hill population were in all their glory. Each party 
strove to secure their votes, by direct bribery and all manner 
of tricks, such as making voters drunk several days before 
the election and keeping them imprisoned in bull pens till 
the polls were opened, when they were marched up in a body, 
headed by their leaders, and closely guarded until their votes 
were deposited in the ballot box. At one of their night meet- 
ings in the country a number of common strumpets from the 
" Holy Land" in Columbia were hired to go out and join 
in the frolic. Old Joel Medlin, Charles Manning, some of 
the Goingses and others made enough by the election to sup- 
port their families for a year. 

One night the Democrats marched down street and raised 
a loud hurrah when just opposite the hall where the other 
party was in session, and some one reported that they were 
coming over to attack the Whigs. Governor Butler called 
out in a voice of thunder, "Let's go out and meet them !" 
but it proved to be a false alarm. Another night a motion 
was made to invite the ladies to the Whig meetings, and 
when objection was raised that the room was too small, 
Colonel McCord rose, and, with a broad grin, said: "Mr. 
President, I think we could squeeze the women in here." 
The election passed peaceably, and resulted in the return of 
Colonel James Gregg, of the Democrats, for Senator, and 
the entire Whig ticket as Representatives : General Adams, 
Captain Tradewell, Captain Wade and Joseph A. Black, who 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 153 



received majorities of from three to thirty, out of over 1,200 
votes. This election was contested, and Edmund Bellinger, 
Esq., of Barnwell, Chairman of the Committee of Privileges 
and Elections, to which it was referred in the House, made a 
report, taking the ground that, as the ballot was intended to 
be secret in this State, neither the Committee nor the Legisla- 
ture had the right to go behind the returns and inquire how 
any man had voted. His report, which might be profitably 
read and studied by our young lawyers and politicians, was 
adopted, and, consequently, the members were all seated. 
But the Legislature was largely Democratic, and they brought 
A. H. Pemberton from Augusta to edit a paper in support of 
their views, giving the new organ the public printing, to the 
exclusion of A. S. Johnston, former State Printer, who ad- 
hered to the fortunes of his friend and relative. Colonel Pres- 
ton. The ensuing controversy between the two editors soon 
led to personalities, followed by a collision, in which John- 
ston struck Pemberton with a switch or stick in Main street, 
and the latter, after blustering loudly, with Bill Myers at his 
back, let the insult pass. Myers was the man who did 7iot 
fight a duel with Captaili Tradewell. During his adminis- 
tration as Intendant, the rock drains, which have been so 
serviceable in carrying off the water from our streets, were 
commenced and met with great opposition from many citi- 
zens, but he persisted in having them built. 

Samuel Weir, a fearless, independent and bitter partisan, 
also edited a Whig paper and applied very filthy and abusive 
language to Pemberton. At the Presidential election of 1840, 
General Harrison, the *'hard cider and log cabin " candi- 
date, defeated Mr. Van Buren, and Mr. Clay was greatly 
elated at the prospect of a triumphant Whig administration, 
with the re-enactment of all his favorite measures; but the 
death of the new President within a month left Vice-Presi- 
dent Tyler at the head of the Government and a change of 
policy ensued. 



154 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



SIDNEY PARK. 



The question who founded the Park having been recently 
made, I addressed the following communication on the sub- 
ject to The Daily Register, and now repeat it here as con- 
nected with my recollections of Columbia: 

The hill side above the springs that supply the city with 
water, extending from Governor Taylor's (now Judge Has- 
kell's) residence to and beyond Shields's foundry, was of 
solid red clay, scored and scarred by a number of deep gul- 
lies that made it very rough and unsightly. A. S. (Sid.) 
Johnston, being in the City Council, proposed that a wide, 
level road should be made around the springs some distance 
above them by cutting down the hill, and that the portion 
below the road should be fenced in and converted into a pub- 
lic park, by planting it in grass, trees, flowers and shrubbery, 
with roads or paths graded and running through it to the 
several springs, which should be opened and protected by 
brick or stone enclosures, having seats at various points for 
the convenience of visitors, and thus making it a place of 
pleasant and healthful resort — an ornament instead of a nui- 
sance and an eye-sore, as it had been. This, the outline of his 
plan, was adopted by the Council and a sufficient sum appro- 
priated to defray the expense, Mr. Johnston directing and for 
some time superintending its execution. Now, is it not 
strange that the very name of one who contributed so much 
to the comfort and convenience of our citizens should be mis- 
spelt over the portals of the park that he established ? [The 
name as painted over the gate leading into the enclosure was 
S-y-dney Park, but it has since been corrected. Such is 
earthly fame !] 

So thoroughly was the Park known as the product of his 
brain and his hands, that the Council, at the time of his 
death I believe, ordered it, in his honor, to be called Sidney 
Park. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 155 



A brother of General Joe Johnston, he was for some years 
State Printer, editor of the Cohimbia Telescope and other 
papers in Columbia, and was also the author and publisher of 
a small volume entitled "The Memoirs of a Nullifier," a 
very caustic and witty production. 

Edward Young, a brother of Charles Young, the tragedian, 
at one time kept a restaurant at one of the springs in the 
Park, and the place was often used for barbecues, fireworks 
and public meetings. 

Algernon Sidney, whose name Mr. Johnston bore, was a 
celebrated Republican writer in the seventeenth century, who 
sealed his devotion to the cause of liberty with his blood, 
being beheaded in the reign of Charles the Second after his 
trial for treason before the infamous Chief Justice Jeffries, 
who, on insufficient evidence, ordered the jury to find him 
guilty and was obeyed. 

It comes within my knowledge that Mr. Glaze, though not 
the founder or projector of the Park, always took a deep 
interest in its promotion and improvement. 

Before the Park was set apart the following exciting scene 
occurred in its vicinity. One summer day, three or four 
little boys from up town were missing at dinner time, when 
such lads are apt to be punctual. A search traced them to 
the reservoir, or basin, on the hill overlooking the Park 
grounds, and some one suggested that they might have got 
over the wall and been drowned by falling into the water. 
This was repeated to the parents of the children, among 
whom were Mr. Hennies, the cooper, and old Mrs. Brown, 
mother of George Brown, the stonecutter, and grandmother 
of one of the boys. She received the news while at home, 
''on hospitable cares intent," and, accoutred as she was, in 
an old loose gown with slipshod slippers and mob cap, 
"her streamers waving in the wind," set out for the place, 
clapping her hands and making a loud outcry at every step. 



158 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



A crowd soon collected, but the wall was ten feet high, and 
while one went for a ladder to surmount it the boys appeared 
emerging from a gully at a distance below. It was then 
noticed, for the first time, that the children could not possi- 
bly have scaled the enclosure. Mrs. Brown welcomed her 
offspring with loud demonstrations of gratitude and delight. 
Not so Mr. Hennies. Provoked at the waste of so much 
time and trouble, he picked up a brickbat and made at his 
son, threatening to kill him, and it was all the bystanders 
could do to keep him from knocking out the boy's brains 
because he had not drowned himself in the basin. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

THE WAR WITH MEXICO. 

Colonel Butler and Lieutenant-Colonel Dickerson— My Assign- 
ment — Robert Latta, John A. Crawford, John Caldwell and 
Henry Lyons — The Freshet of 1852 — My Election as Cashier — 
The Suspension of 1857 — The College Riot. 

In 1846 came the war with Mexico, and my son Henry, 
excited by the speeches of some of our leading men who 
spoke of ''bleaching their bones on the Rio Grande" but 
took care to stay at home, volunteered for the campaign. 
Ex-Governor P. M. Butler, though absent from the State at 
the time, was elected Colonel of the Palmetto Regiment, 

and Dickerson, of Camden, Lieutenant-Colonel, with 

A. H. Gladden as Major. On their departure, late in Decem- 
ber, 1846, they were addressed by Governor David Johnson. 
Major N. R. Eaves, a wealthy and patriotic old bachelor of 
Chester, although of small stature and beyond middle age, 
bore the flag of his company and went through the campaign 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 157 



unhurt; and Colonel H. I. Caughman, of Lexington, volun- 
teered in the ranks as a private, receiving in the suburbs of 
the Mexican capital a wound in the foot which lamed him 
for life. 

The survivors returned in July, 1848, under command of 
Major Gladden, both Butler and Dickerson having been 
killed shortly before our army entered the City of Mexico. 
They were greeted with great demonstrations of joy and 
gratitude in Columbia, where a grand military parade, a 
torchlight procession, the universal illumination of the town 
and any number of addresses were pronounced in their honor. 
My son came home in safety, after participating in the cap- 
ture of Vera Cruz, the march to the valley of Mexico and 
the fighting around that city before its surrender. As a 
singular fact, it was noticed that of the poor men from the 
country, who were used to roughing it while at home, more 
died in proportion to their number than of the city boys, 
unaccustomed as they were to the exposure and privations of 
the camp. 

The remains of Colonel Butler were afterwards brought 
back from Mexico and received in Columbia in the presence 
of a large concourse of our people, who were addressed on 
the occasion by General (then Colonel) John S. Preston; 
and those of Lieutenant Colonel Dickerson were honored in 
like manner at Camden. 

In 1848 I was forced, by the failure of a friend for whom 
I had endorsed largely, to make an assignment of all my 
property, which was worth about seven thousand dollars. In 
this assignment I provided for the payment of my own debts 
in full, and on the security liabilities in proportion to the 
number of other sureties; thus, if there were but one beside 
myself, to pay one-half; if two, one-third, &c.; so that if the 
others paid their shares no creditor would lose by us. If my 
property should prove insufficient to meet such payments I 



158 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



proposed making up the deficiency out of my future earnings 
and asked for no discharge till the payments were made. The 
Commercial Bank, as one of the largest creditors, not only 
acquiesced in the proposed arrangement, but assisted me in 
carrying it out by electing my son to the office of Bookkeeper, 
(just then made vacant by the death of Alexander Campbell,) 
with a salary of fifteen hundred dollars. My assets falling 
short, we devoted all we made for upwards of three years to 
the fulfilment of the agreement. This statement is made 
because it affords me the opportunity of recording my obli- 
gations to John A. Crawford, John Caldwell and Robert 
Latta for their aid in effecting my design. The two first 
named generously offered, of their own accord, to buy in at 
my sale such property as I needed, and, after paying for same, 
to wait with me till I could redeem it, allowing me to keep 
and use it in the meantime. Mr. Latta had not been thought 
of by any of us in connection with the affair. He had retired 
from active business with a large fortune, and removed from 
the up country to Columbia some years previously, buying 
and occupying the place now known as the Benedict Institute, 
which had belonged to Major Tom Taylor. Being a Director 
in the Commercial Bank, and owning one thousand shares of 
its stock, he visited it nearly every day, and the officers 
became very well acquainted with him. He was a tall, thin 
old man, who paid very little attention to anything but his 
own business, watching over it incessantly, and exacting from 
his numerous tenants and other debtors the uttermost farthing 
that they owed him, to such an extent that his reputation was 
that of a close-fisted miser, who cared for nothing but his 
own interest, and he was probably the last man that I would 
have thought of going to for a favor. But his conduct in my 
case proved how greatly his character was mistaken. On the 
day before my sale he came to the bank, and, taking me out, 
inquired if it was true that my house was to be sold on the 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 159 



morrow. Receiving an answer in the affirmative, he pro- 
posed, if I would let him, to buy the house and give rae my 
own time to pay for it. I told him in reply that he took me 
very much by surprise — that I had no claims upon him; had 
not expected such an offer, and had arranged for the purchase 
to be made by Crawford and Caldwell, but that I would take 
him at his word, with many thanks, and leave them to buy in 
my personal effects. Accordingly, when the sale took place, 
he bid for my homestead as much as I thought it was worth, 
and offered to go further, but I allowed it to be knocked 
down to the agent of one of the Charleston creditors for three 
thousand dollars. He then bought for me the house on Lady 
street for about half that price. During the summer he went 
to New York by way of Charleston, and on arriving there 
wrote to me that whilst in Charleston he had bought my 
house from the purchaser at the sale and that I should have 
it back on his return. When he returned in the fall he ex- 
changed the one place for the other, leaving me to pay the 
lower price for the better house, and saying I should have 
had my house if he had received nothing in exchange for it. 
In justice to his memory*, and in gratitude for his generosity, 
I could not do less than to make these facts public. 

In another respect he showed an inconsistency such as I 
have observed in many other persons, though perhaps not in 
the same degree. 

In making improvements in the grounds about his house he 
consulted Mr. Crawford as to the size, form and location of 
the outhouses and other appurtenances, even for the building 
of a pig pen. Yet at this time he went to Charleston, and, 
without asking advice from any one, made changes in his 
investments to "the extent of thirty thousand dollars, thus 
proving that he had confidence in his own judgment when 
large amounts were involved, whilst unable to decide on the 
merest trifles. 



160 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Mr. Crawford was one of the best friends I ever had, not 
only on that occasion but to the end of his life, in 1876. He 
had a full share of his native Irish self-confidence, with great 
decision of character, a strong will and very impulsive tem- 
perament, indulging and expressing his likes and dislikes 
quite freely. He was a close observer of men and things, 
without much education, and rather inclined to disparage 
book learning; had been well trained as a merchant and 
bookkeeper, was a pretty good physician and had a decided 
mechanical turn, never seeing a piece of machinery without 
suggesting some change or improvement in it. As a practical 
business man, his strong, clear common sense and untiring 
industry enabled him to manage the bank with great success, 
while securing and retaining the confidence of the Directors, 
the stockholders and the community. 

Mr. Caldwell, with less education and no training, gained 
a large fortune and attained a place among the foremost rank 
in mercantile life, being for many years a successful cotton 
factor and President of the Exchange Bank and also of the 
South Carolina Railroad, which, with its extended and com- 
plicated interests and connections, he managed admirably. 
Some months before my assignment he asked me one day how 
I expected to get through- my difficulties, and when I told 
him I should have nothing left he replied quietly: ''If you 
need any help, call on me." 

And here I must notice Captain Henry Lyons, who some 
years later became a Director of the bank and was a citizen of 
too much prominence to be passed over in silence. He had 
been a merchant for many years, and, after marrying when on 
the old bachelor's list, retired with a competency, and owned 
the valuable house and lot at the Southeast corner of Bull 
and Lady streets, where he lived in princely style, enjoying 
the fruits of an extensive garden, orchard, vineyard and hot- 
houses. A very heavy, corpulent man, with strongly marked 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 161 



Jewish features, of free and easy manners and address, and 
very simple and confiding disposition, he had traveled in 
Southern Europe and in Cuba, knew everybody in and 
about Columbia, both whites and blacks, while, with a never 
failing fund of good humor, he had a good word for all he 
met. He served as Mayor or Intendant more than one term, 
and whilst in that office met with the following adventure: 
Josh Sowden, Chief of Police, having shown him one morn- 
ing a dispatch from Augusta with a notice that a noted pick- 
pocket would arrive in Columbia that day, he proposed to 
Colonel Maybin, one of the Aldermen, that they should take 
a stroll up town and look out for the fellow, but failing to 
find him they separated, and the Captain started home. 
Somewhere on upper Bull street he was accosted by a well 
dressed stranger with some remark on the beauty of Colum- 
bia. This was taking him on his weak side and they readily 
engaged in conversation while walking down till near his 
home, when the gentleman, bidding him good morning, took 
his course towards Main street, leaving the Captain delighted 
with his companion. Some time in the course of the day he 
had a call for some money, and on searching his pockets 
missed the wallet in which he always carried small change. 
After a thorough search it could not be found and he sup- 
posed he had accidentally dropped it. But a few days after it 
was found in the Presbyterian church yard near the wall 
where the two had passed, but without any money, and it 
then appeared that the unsuspecting Mayor had been robbed 
by the very thief he was looking for. 

At his suggestion an exhibition of fruit was got up in Co- 
lumbia, over which he presided, and once a week in the 
summer season a fine collection was exhibited in the hall above 
Dr. Gibbes's printing office on Washington street, near Newn- 
ham's present paint shop. He and Mayor Guignard had 
each a square of four acres mostly in trees, Mr. Crawford had 



162 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



two acres, and Mrs, Mayrant and myself orchards of con- 
siderable size, and we also received contributions from others 
in town as well as from William Summer of Pomaria, Dr. 
Kirsh of Chester, Mr. Fentress, of Greensboro, N. C, and 
from various other places. Our exhibitions were largely at- 
tended, both by visitors and by members of the association, 
who examined, tested and passed upon the comparative merits 
of the specimens on hand, reporting same for premiums to 
the State Fair in November, which met too late in the season 
for many varieties. Thus, by showing the numbers, variety 
and excellence of fruits produced in the State, a taste and 
competition for their cultivation was created, which added 
very much to their production. And such an institution ought 
to be reorganized now, since it would promote the health, 
comfort and profit of the whole community. 

One morning Mr. Crawford, while taking a drive, found 
at Asylum Branch a round yellow flint rock looking like 
a fine plum in shape and color, but twice the size that 
fruit ever gets to be. This he brought to the bank, 
where as Secretary of the association I received all fruit 
intended for exhibition, and with a bit of court plaster 
fastened the stem from a large plum to one end of it, so that 
it closely resembled that fruit. We then put it on the table 
with other fruit and awaited the coming of Captain Lyons, 
who upon seeing it broke into exclamations of surprise and 
delight, inquiring whence it came, and what was its name, 
and directing me to be particularly careful in taking its 
dimensions both lengthwise and otherwise. Crawford told 
him it was a new variety called the stone plum, and forbid 
his handling it in any way. For a quarter of an hour he 
talked of nothing else, and after scanning it from all sides 
he could no longer resist the temptation to pick it up, when, 
feeling how hard and heavy it was, he collapsed with a loud 
and long Oh! In the weekly publication of our proceedings 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 163 



we mentioned the magnificent stone plum and William Sum- 
mer wrote for cuttings. The Captain was an incessant 
smoker, from his uprising to his down lying, and often on 
waking at night would light a cigar and puff away for an 
hour or more. 

He propagated the first Chinese cling peach in this coun- 
try — a distinct and very choice variety, remarkable for its 
size, beauty and flavor, so juicy that it ought to be eaten in a 
plate or saucer. The cuttings were received from China by 
A. J. Downing, a New York horticulturist and author of a 
popular book on fruits. Fearing they might be killed by the 
cold in that Northern region, he sent them to Captain Lyons, 
who succeeded in raising the trees, from which came all 
others bearing that name, and their number is legion. The 
honey peach, a small almond-shaped free-stone fruit, too 
sweet for ordinary taste, came at the same time and was pro- 
duced in the same way. 

His death was caused by excessive fat, which for some 
months prevented his breathing except in an upright posi- 
tion and finally obstructed the action of his heart. 

Lewis Levy came in one day and told us, rather tediously, 
with what care he had trimmed and pruned a newly bought 
plum tree, and when Crawford inquired if he had cut it off 
below where it was budded he gave him a tanyard look and 
replied: "Do you think I'm a gau dam fool?" Some very 
large and long green persimmons were on our table once, 
when Dr. Fair seeing them picked one up and asked what it 
was. Being told it was a bob-tailed banana, he stuck his 
teeth into it and took a good bite, which drew his mouth 
quite out of shape. 

The great freshet of July, 1852, found me at Lexington, 
where I had gone to attend poor Tom Caughman's funeral. 
Returning on Sunday afternoon, I was greatly surprised on 
reaching the top of the hill beyond the bridge to see so many 



Wi KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



people on this side of the river gazing upon the scene. On 
nearing the bridge I found the water running across the road 
for a distance of twenty or thirty yards, with all the low 
grounds covered, and the river, an angry and tumultuous sea 
of muddy water, full of logs and trash. These, as they swept 
downwards, scraped the floor beneath the bridge, and, strik- 
ing the upright boards that enclosed the structure on the 
South side and were loose at their lower ends, would sway 
them back and forth with a force that made the entire frame- 
work quiver as if about to float off into the stream. The 
bridge across Broad River had been swept off that morning 
and rested against one of. the piers of the Columbia Bridge, 
which it partially displaced. Mounted on an active little 
gray mare from Hitchcock's stable, I had intended stopping 
near the middle of the bridge to view the scene, but soon, 
becoming aware of the danger, I gave her the reins, and she, 
apparently as much scared as myself, took me over in double- 
quick time. That night the water ran through the floor of 
the bridge, and I was the last person that crossed till the 
damaged pier was repaired some weeks after. 

The Greenville Railroad bridge at Alston was also carried 
away, and it led to the drowning of Colonel Wm. Spencer 
Brown, Chief Engineer of the road, and a son of McCollum, 
one of the employees. Brown and McCollum, with a fifteen 
year old son of the latter, being at Alston, proposed going to 
Columbia in a batteau, by floating and paddling in the shal- 
low water that covered the low grounds and the bed of the 
road on the East side of the river. Colonel Adam Summer, 
who was present, endeavored to dissuade them from the dan- 
gerous attempt, or at least from taking the hid with them, on 
the promise of sending him to Columbia on horseback. But 
as Brown was anxious to see the condition of the river at such 
a time, and they were all expert swimmers, Summer's advice 
was unheeded. They embarked in tolerably smooth water, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 165 



and proceeded safely a mile or two, when their boat was upset 
at a distance from the land and they were all thrown out. 
The boy w^as at first supported on his father's shoulders, while 
Brown continued for some time in speaking distance and con- 
versed with them. But they soon became separated; the 
youth lost his hold and got beyond the reach of his father, 
who managed to catch a limb and scramble up into a tree, 
whence his cries were heard on the shore and he was saved. 
His son's body was found a few miles below, but that of 
Colonel Brown floated down near Columbia, where it was not 
discovered till about a month later. 

In this year (1852) B. D. Boyd, who had succeeded 
iVndrew McLauchlin as Cashier of the bank, resigned that 
office and I was elected in his place, with a salary of two 
thousand dollars, which was subsequently increased to twenty- 
five hundred, and, owing to the depreciation in the currency 
before the end of the war, to seven thousand. The bank's 
business was safe and prosperous up to the beginning of the 
war in 1861, paying semi-annual dividends of eight to ten 
per cent, per annum, except when prevented by the panic 
and suspension of i857,xat which time about one-half of the 
South Carolina banks stopped specie payment and were sus- 
tained in that course for one year by the injudicious action of 
the Legislature ; the other half, including the old Commer- 
cial, continuing to meet all demands on presentation at a 
cost of their regular profits for that period. 

Our capital was eight hundred thousand dollars, with the 
privilege of issuing notes to thrice that amount, but we never 
could keep out as much as the capital. And to show how 
business w^as conducted then, I will state that all our means 
consistent with safety were actively and constantly employed. 
In the fall and winter months we assisted in moving the crops 
by advancing to purchasers of cotton for their drafts, gene- 
rally at thirty days' date, upon Charleston factors of good 



166 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Standing, whose acceptances were met at maturity from sales 
of the produce. When the winter was over we loaned freely 
to approved planters on six months' time, in anticipation of 
their crops. The law limited the rate of bank interest to one 
per cent, for sixty days or six per cent, per annum, and we 
observed it strictly. 

Besides, we collected for all the Kentucky banks, which 
did a very large business in lending to their drovers on their 
drafts and acceptances, made payable in December and Janu- 
ary at our bank, for the stock which they bought at home 
and drove to South Carolina, where, on selling out, they 
swept the up country clear of money to meet their obliga- 
tions in our hands. These payments gave us the command of 
the currency of the other banks, which we sent to Charles- 
ton, where they all redeemed, for the purchase of Northern 
exchange. That exchange was remitted by our agent in the 
city to the Fulton Bank, New York, for our credit, and we 
drew upon it to pay the Kentucky banks what we had col- 
lected for them, getting the exchange at par or at a discount 
and charging our Kentucky correspondents a premium. 

In addition to this, we made a very advantageous arrange- 
ment with the Columbus Insurance Company of Mississippi. 
That State had no banks and its people were dependent upon 
the issues of those in other States for a circulating medium. 
The company borrowed our bills in large amounts and used 
them in advancing to the neighboring planters on their crops, 
taking drafts upon their factors in Mobile and New Orleans, 
which were forwarded to banks in those cities for collection, 
and, when accepted by the factors and endorsed by the com- 
pany, were discounted and the proceeds remitted to our New 
York correspondent. Thus we obtained a circulation for our 
notes at a distant point, where they remained out for a long 
period before their return for redemption, meantime receiving 
interest upon their amount and getting Northern exchange 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 167 



from the collecting banks at a considerable discount, which 
we used for local demand and in payment of our Kentucky 
collections. 

COLLEGE RIOT. 

In 1856, an outrageous riot of the students in the College 
threatened the peace and safety of the place for a short time. 
It originated in the arrest of one or two of their number for 
drunkenness and disorderly conduct in the street at night. 
When the offenders, after a stout resistance, were put in the 
guard house, some of the collegians went there and in 
attempting their release had a fight with the police. As I 
understood, President C. F. McCay obtained their discharge 
for the time, but was unable to control them further, and 
next day a couple or more of them made a violent assault on 
John Burdell, Chief Marshal, in the guard house yard, but 
with the aid of Sonendrecker, another of the guard, they 
were very roughly handled and got decidedly worsted in the 
fight. Then, when they returned to the College, the boys, 
in a body, some armed ^nd intoxicated, marched up to the 
guard house to get satisfaction, forgetting the fact that they 
had been the aggressors throughout. 

The Mayor, Edward J. Arthur, seeing the hostile demon- 
stration, ordered the alarm bell to be rung, and when the 
citizens assembled, Jesse E. Dent, the Sheriff, summoned 
them to protect the police and keep the peace. I saw 
thirty or forty of them ranged, under arms, in front of the 
guard house, with Sheriff Dent, who was unarmed, at their 
head, while a great mass of students, within fifteen or twenty 
feet, some showing guns, pistols and sticks, cursed, defied 
and dared them to fire. When two or three cocked their 
guns, and were about to shoot into the crowd, the Sheriff, by 
his coolness, prevented a bloody outbreak, ordering them to 



168 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



act on the defensive and wait till they were attacked. Mean- 
while Colonel R. H. Goodwyn and Dr. Allen J. Green placed 
themselves between the parties, and, at the risk of their lives, 
with uplifted hands, in loud tones, earnestly adjured them to 
forbear. Finally, it was said. Dr. Thornwell appeared upon 
the scene, and, calling upon the boys to follow him to the 
College, was obeyed. Some of them were indicted for the 
riot and assault, but I believe the cases were compromised 
before the Court met. 

There was great dissatisfaction with the result, some insist- 
ing that the disturbance should have been quelled at all 
hazards, whilst others, making all due allowance for the youth 
and inexperience of the students and for their false impres- 
sion that, as a point of honor, they were bound to sustain 
one another, right or wrong, thought that, in a case of such 
open and flagrant defiance of the law, the offenders ought to 
have been fined and imprisoned as were all others in like 
circumstances, and that their connection with an institution 
supported by the State, so far from entitling them to such 
exclusive exemption from punishment, was an additional 
reason for its enforcement. 



CHAPTER XXVir. 

THE CONFEDERATE WAR. 

Passing over all intervening circumstances, I come now to 
the war, which commenced with the capture of Fort Sumter 
in April, 1861, and ended in the same month of the year 
1865. 

Early in December, i860, the Secession Convention had 
met in the Baptist Church, in Columbia, but just then the 
smallpox made its appearance in the city, and the Convention 
adjourned to meet in Charleston, where the Ordinance of 
Secession was passed on the 20th of that month. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 169 



During the war, and for some months previous to its begin- 
ning, I kept a diary, in which were noted all rumors and 
events of importance, but its contents are too voluminous and 
its general run too well known for repetition here, though 
they may be valuable and interesting for future reference. 

In October, 1862, the Central Association for Relief of 
South Carolina soldiers was formed in Columbia, with Dr. M. 
LaBorde, President; Dr. John Fisher, Treasurer; H. C. 
Bronson, Secretary; and the following other members: Rev. 
Peter J. Shand, Rev. Wm. Martin, Rev. B. M. Palmer, Dr. 
R. W. Gibbes, Wm. F. DeSaussure, E. L. Kerrison, John 
Townsend and John A. Crawford. They met once a week, 
and were generally all present. The extent and value of the 
services rendered by these gentlemen have never been known, 
much less appreciated. They undertook to ascertain and 
supply the wants of our troops, to the extent of the means 
furnished by State appropriations and private contributions, 
sending their own agents to inquire what was most needed by 
the different commands wherever stationed, besides purchas- 
ing supplies and forwarding same, together with all articles 
of food, clothing, <S>:c., fiirnished by the people at home for 
their friends in the army. For this purpose they organized a 
bureau under the active, efficient and untiring supervision of 
Mr. Kerrison, who gave probably more in time, labor and 
money to the cause than any other individual in the State. 
He opened a storehouse for receiving, purchasing, keeping 
and forwarding everything intended for the troops. Rev. 
Mr. Martin and Mr. Leiding superintended the packing and 
shipping department. Asher Palmer, W. P. Price and O. A. 
Pickle were agents of transportation, with the assistance 

occasionally of John Beard, Daniel Crawford, Rev. Mr. 

Barnwell, until his lamented death, and others, taking charge 
of goods and going with trains to their respective destina- 
tions, where they were turned over to those properly author- 



170 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



ized to receive and receipt for them. By these means the 
safe and rapid delivery of every package, great or small, was, 
as far as possible, secured and accounted for. 

An immense amount of labor was also required in corres- 
ponding with the Confederate and State officials, railroads, 
contractors and others, and in appointing and watching over 
agents, besides keeping an account of shipments and pur- 
chases, as well as of all receipts and expenditures. 

Mr. DeSaussure, as Chairman of a Committee, reported in 
January, 1865, that the amount disbursed during the past 
year amounted to ^1,192,588, to wit: 

Supplies bought and forwarded by the Association — cost 
price $561,055 

Packages and boxes sent to us and forwarded to the 

army — estimated value 560,000 

Salaries and expenses of the Bureau and transporta- 
tion 71.533 

The Committee also reported the following resolution, 
which was adopted : 

"The laborious, efficient and indefatigable services ren- 
dered by Mr. Kerrison and Mr. Leiding to the cause of the 
army and the country, most generously without compensa- 
tion, except the satisfaction derived from the discharge of 
this important trust, does not require comment. They will 
have their reward in the earnest approval of a grateful coun- 
try." 

Mr. Leiding refused the salary that was offered him. Mr. 
Martin being without other means of support received a 
moderate compensation, and the rest of the Board got no 
pay. 



KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 171 



Hon. Joseph Daniel Pope during the war was Chief Collec- 
tor of the Confederate taxes and head of the Bureau for the 
printing of the Confederate Treasury notes and bonds. Most 
of the men being in the war, the Government employed females 
for the preparation of the Confederate notes in Columbia, 
and a large number of most respectable ladies from Virginia 
to Texas, who had lost their fortunes by the war, made a 
decent support in this way. About a hundred of them, with 
fifty men, under his supervision, handled, counted, signed and 
put up in packages the entire issues of the Government, aggre- 
gating some thousand million of dollars in amount, three 
large printing establishments being employed in the depart- 
ments of printing, engraving, &c. This, of course, involved 
immense care, time and labor. But, to the honor of all con- 
cerned, not a dollar was lost, stolen or embezzled, and Mr. 
Pope turned over to W. Y. Leitch, Assistant Treasurer, the 
entire and exact sum that had been entrusted to him. In the 
collection of the Confederate taxes, he also appointed about 
an equal number of assistants or sub-collectors throughout 
the State, who received from the citizens their respective 
quotas in money and in kind. This, too, was accounted for 
to the last cent, and Mr. Pope's record as an able, honest, 
industrious and most efficient officer stands without a blot. 

At the death of Mr. Bronson in May, 1863, I was elected 
to his place in the Relief Association, and as its Secretary, 
and its minutes to the end of the war are in my possession. 
By request of the Board I visited our troops in Virginia 
in November, 1862, going by railroad to Richmond and 
Staunton, and thence to Winchester in the stage, having 
obtained in Richmond from Mr. Randolph, Secretary o 
War, a passport, with orders for transportation wherever 
I wanted to go. The fertile region of the Shenandoah 
Valley was then a scene of utter desolation for many miles, 
not a building, fence or even gate-post being left, except 



172 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



a few stone barns, whose outside walls withstood all efforts 
for their destruction. General Longstreet's command 
marched through Winchester the morning of my arrival, 
returning from the Maryland campaign, after the battle 
of Sharpsburg, and I there met with Colonel Wm. Wal- 
lace, Colonel Joe Gist and other acquaintances from South 
Carolina. At the Ballard House, where I stopped in Rich- 
mond, General Bragg, just from a successful campaign in 
Tennessee, received great attention, and at another hotel I 
met General Loring, who had lost an arm in the Mexican 
war. 

After waiting a day or two at Winchester for transporta- 
tion to General Gregg's headquarters, near Berryville, I walked 
out one evening to the toll gate on the turnpike in that direc- 
tion and was taken up in his buggy by Judge Camden of 
Rockbridge County, who was going to see a son in the army. 
We traveled to a late hour, seeking lodgings, which were 
refused us, at several places, although we offered to pay our 
way, the occupants seeming afraid to entertain strangers, lest 
they might be considered as adhering to one side or the other, 
that region being then held alternately by the Federal and 
Confederate forces. I spent one day and night with General 
Gregg, seeing General A. P. Hill, the Haskells, Colonels 
McCorkle, Hamilton, Simpson and Perrin, Captain Hunt of 
Edwards's regiment, and other officers, and also many 
privates of my acquaintance from South Carolina, and dining 
with a Lexington company on a choice leg of mutton, nice 
biscuits and a cup of buttermilk. Next morning the owner 
of the land occupied by the camp reported to General Gregg 
that two of his best Merino sheep were missing, and I then 
suspected from what quarter my dinner of mutton had come, 
but said nothing. General Gregg told me that whilst he and 
General Hill were on their way from Harper's Ferry to Sharps- 
burg, while the battle was going on, they met and passed 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 173 



enough stragglers from our army to have gained us the vic- 
tory if they had been in the fight. General Hill took their 
swords from several officers and broke them in their presence, 
whilst reprimanding them severely. They were seeking food 
and not exemption from danger. And thus for want of disci- 
pline and supplies we lost the chance of probably ending the 
war by a successful march on Philadelphia or Washington, as 
just then Louis Napoleon was urging on Great Britain the 
joint interference and mediation of France and England in 
behalf of peace and the recognition of our independence. 
On Sunday I met Stonewall Jackson returning from church 
at Berryville. Some cavalry passed through the village the 
night before, and that morning Ewell's Division went down 
the road towards Ashby's Gap, with their baggage train, in 
which I counted three hundred and fifty heavily loaded 
wagons and one hundred and five belonging to Stonewall 
Jackson's Brigade — many more than I had previously thought 
necessary. 

Returning from Winchester by way of Staunton, I arrived 
at Culpeper Court House in a furious snow storm. There 
General Kershaw, General Jenkins and General Anderson 
furnished me such information as I desired. A few miles 
below, at the camp of General Hood's command, I met Cap- 
tain Bachman with his artillery and. that of Captain Garden 
from Sumter. In Winchester and Richmond I wrote to the 
commanders of such corps as could not be reached, directing 
them how and where to apply for such supplies as they needed. 

THE BURNING OF COLUMBIA. 

The burning of Columbia on the night of Friday, February 
17th, 1865, deserves particular notice, and I therefore quote 
from memory and from my diary the facts connected there- 
with as they came to my knowledge: 



174 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Sitnday. Februaj-y 12. — Fearing the city might fall into the 
enemy's hands, we this day sent a load of books and valua- 
bles belonging to the Commercial Bank by W. W. Renwick's 
wagon to his residence in Union District, between Enoree, 
Tyger and Broad Rivers, for safe-keeping. We were roused 
at an early hour by the firing of cannon on Arsenal Hill as a 
signal for the reserved and detailed force to assemble. My 
son Henry, Bookkeeper of the Bank, was to have gone with 
the wagon, but being one of the reserves he refused to leave 
town, his Captain (Robertson) having notified him to be 
ready at a moment's warning to go to the front. Mr. Craw- 
ford, President, therefore followed the wagon in his buggy. 
The weather was terribly cold. I went to the Methodist 
Church and sat for the first and last time in the pew I had 
selected the day before, hearing an excellent sermon from 
Rev. Mr. Conner, our stationed preacher for that year. Dar- 
ing the day Colonel J. P. Thomas's regiment of reserves 
paraded one or two hundred strong and were reviewed by 
Governor Magrath. S. W. Capers shut up the Express office 
and went into the ranks. 

Monday, ijth. — Mr. S. O. Talley, our Teller, being noti- 
fied by Captain Robertson of orders to march, left the bank, 
as did also my son Henry when so informed. I was alone 
in the bank, but heard that Mr. Crawford had got back after 
seeing the wagon beyond Spring Hill. 

Tuesday, 14th. — Busy all day with Mr. Crawford preparing 
to close the bank. Heavy firing heard in afternoon about 
Congaree Creek, with rumors that Orangeburg was taken. 
About dusk the alarm bell rang, and Mr. Crawford went 
home, leaving me to send books to his house and carry a few 
things home; packed them up hastily, and inquiring in the 
street what the alarm bell meant, heard that Saluda Factory 
was burnt, and could see fire in that direction. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 175 



Wednesday, i^th. — Went to Charleston depot to get car to 
go to Manchester for corn from Governor Manning, but Bol- 
lin refused to furnish it and said the railroad bridge below 
was burnt. Ex-Governor John L. Manning had for several 
years generously supplied the officers of our bank with pro- 
visions at greatly reduced prices, and sometimes gratis. 
Hampton reported the Yankees within six miles last night. 
Fighting heard all day, and coming nearer, but it ceased 
about 5 o'clock P. M. General Beauregard arrived to-night 
and expects some of Hardee's army before day. Cheatham's, 
from Augusta, are reported coming; some say already here. 

Thursday, i6th. — Wheeler's men burnt Saluda Bridge last 
night; they have been robbing our stores to-day, and several 
were broken open by them last night. A number of troops 
arrived last night from Wilmington. The city has been 
shelled from across the river nearly all day and part of yes- 
terday. Mayor Goodwyn says Beauregard tells him he can 
hold the place but two or three days longer, as Hardee refuses 
to evacuate Charleston. The confusion and excitement of 
removing Government stores and treasure and private families 
is beyond parallel. 

Friday, lyth. — Woke by a terrific explosion, shaking the 
whole town as by an earthquake. The storehouse of the 
South Carolina Railroad was blown up, accidentally or other- 
wise. At daylight Henry tells me that Mayor Goodwyn 
informed him of his intention to surrender forthwith, having 
white flag ready. Going to bank, delivered some packages 
to their owners and put others in vault; then for the last time 
locked it up. Heard that the Mayor was gone to surrender, 
and while at Henry's, over the bank, Mrs. Rawls came in say- 
ing Yankees were at her house near the river. Rapid firing 
continued all the morning towards Broad River Bridge, the 
Columbia Bridge having been burnt last night. Early this 
morning General Hampton had threatened to shoot any one 



1T6 EANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



who offered to raise the white flag, but about 9 o'clock he 
directed Mayor Goodwyn to surrender, and before 10 a com- 
pany of Wheeler's cavalry passed down Main street ordering 
all soldiers to leave it as the enemy were coming in. About 
that hour a carriage displaying the United States flag, with an 
officer or two and the Mayor, drove rapidly down to the 
Market, where I went and saw Colonel Stone, who had received 
the surrender, with Aldermen McKenzie, Bates and a few 
citizens. Mr. McKenzie informed me that the surrender was 
unconditional, and I then asked the Colonel: "Will private 
property be respected in the city?" He seemed indignant at 
the question, and replied: "Private property will be re- 
spected ; we are not savages. If you let us alone, we will let 
you alone." He was a handsome young officer, Avho looked 
and spoke like a gentleman, and I believed him. These 
assurances he repeated to others in my presence. I thanked 
him, and, returning to the bank, informed Henry's wife that 
I thought she could remain there in safety till evening, when 
I would take her to my house. As the carriage passed she 
became frantic with excitement, and declared her purpose to 
wave a Confederate banner from the window, which I pre- 
vented her from trying to do. On my way home I saw some 
of the first troops that marched in leave their ranks and break 
open Mordecai's and Heise's liquor shops with axes. While 
I was stopping at the engine house, next above the Market, 
one of them came across the street, followed by a negro, and 
demanded admittance into J. C. Walker's store, whereupon 
Walker handed him the key of the front door, and he and 
the negro went in. Just then some of them were trying to 
force the front door of James G. Gibbes's store, where 
McKenzie's confectionery now is, and in a minute or two 
the side door, next the Court House, was broken open and 
the negroes and soldiers streamed in and helped themselves. 
I then went home, seeing piles of cotton bales on fire in the 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 177 



middle of Main street South of Washington street. Half an 
hour later I was told that a soldier was in my kitchen, in the 
basement of the dwelling, ransacking it. Going down to 
the door I demanded to know what he was doing there. He 
came up to me and replied that he was foraging. I asked for 
his authority, and another who was with him presented his 
musket, saying that was his authority. I then told them that 
Colonel Stone had assured me private property would be pro- 
tected, and that they were acting contrary to the orders of 
their officers, and one of them replied that they didn't care 
a d'n for the officers but would have what they wanted. 
They then said if I would go up stairs they would stay below. 
I did so, and, telling my wife and daughter what they said, I 
went to Main street for a guard. On the way, Dr. Boatwright 
told me that Colonel Nichols, at the Market, had given him a 
guard, and when I applied to that officer; apprising him of 
what was going on at my house, he called a soldier named 
Ruble and bid him go with me and turn the fellows out at 
the point of the bayonet. Returning with Ruble I was told 
one of them had been up stairs, searching all the rooms, and 
had taken my gun. I then went down where they were with 
the guard, and found they had been in the store room and 
taken meat and flour which was loaded on one of my ponies. 
They refused to leave the place, and as they were two to the 
guard's one and as well armed as he was, he was powerless. 
Seeing that they were drinking and becoming more violent, 
I went back to the street for another guard, and with great 
difficulty, after applying to several officers, found one at 
Janney's corner, who sent a young man with me named 
Turner. Turner declared that the other guard knew not his 
duty or he would have driven the ruffians out. When we 
returned they were gone with the ponies, meat, flour and 
some articles of little value from up stairs. While going down 
Main street to Janney's, towards 12 o'clock. General Sher- 



178 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



man and bis staff rode up. The soldiers were then breaking 
open and robbing the stores within his sight and hearing. 
After dinner I went back to the bank with a negro to bring 
some of Henry's things to my house. Large bodies of troops 
were marching down Main street, and a soldier with several 
negroes was in Henry's rooms. Left them to get a guard for 
the place, and, meeting Mr. Dovilliers, heard that Major 
Jenkins, at Nickerson's Hotel, was Provost Marshal for plac- 
ing guards. The street and pavements were crowded with 
drunken soldiers, rioting, plundering, throwing out goods 
from the stores, scrambling for them and making a perfect 
Pandemonium. They were as closely packed as beeves in a 
pen, and to reach Nickerson's we had to take a cross street 
and go round the square. The bar room of the hotel 
was filled with anxious crowds praying for guards, among 
whom I recollect seeing old Mr. Alfred Huger and Mrs. 
Dr. John Fisher. After waiting till near night I got 
speech of Major Jenkins and stated the condition of 
things at the bank — females occupying the rooms over- 
head and vaults filled from floor to ceiling with valuable 
property of private citizens — begging him to send guards 
for their protection. He replied: "I cannot under- 
take to protect private property." In the course of the 
afternoon I had met Colonel Stone and asked for a guard, but 
he turned off, saying he had no time to attend to me, though 
he was standing idle in the Market place. Returned to bank 
and took Henry's wife to my house. Ordered an early supper; 
and told all to go to bed. Then went down stairs to see 
Turner, the guard, and found two white men with him, who 
he said were officers that had just been released from impris- 
onment here. Begged him to turn them out, shut the doors 
and go to sleep, for I feared the house would be burnt before 
morning, as the streets were so full of drunken, disorderly 
negroes and soldiers, breaking open stores and committing 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 179 



Other outrages that I could hardly get back to the bank. 
Up stairs sat half an hour with the other guard and saw the 
light of a fire in the direction of Charleston depot, on Bridge 
street. Hampton's house, on Camden road, and Arthur's, 
in the suburbs, were burnt before night. Just after dark 
Puryear's, at race track, and Dr. John Wallace's were on fire. 
Charlotte Railroad track, in sight from my back door, was 
also burning. Went to bed with clothes on, and about lo 
o'clock heard fowls in the yard squalling and men catching 
them. The light of the fire grew brighter towards Main 
street, and after getting up two or three times to look at it 
had gone to sleep, when at 2 o'clock my old negro. Quash, 
woke me at the back door, saying Mrs. Zimmerman, next 
door, was moving out her furniture and I must get up, as the 
orders were to burn every house. All rose, and, by my direc- 
tions, put on all the clothes they could and made bundles of 
what they could carry. A drunken officer with two soldiers, 
his sword and spurs clanking at every step, soon after came in 
at front gate and demanded to know what was in the house. 
I told him the usual furniture. He wished to see and 
stamped through the passage in the dark to the head of the 
inside steps, where, when I opened the door, he stumbled 
from top to bottom and I saw him no more. One of his pri- 
vates said they were ordered to remove all combustibles that 
would blow up the house and I gave him what powder I had. 
The fire by this time was raging and roaring furiously, extend- 
ing gradually further up Main street, the wind veering from 
Southwest to Northwest and blowing a perfect gale. On Wash- 
ington street all the buildings on both sides had been consumed 
except the Female College, as far as the West side of Bull 
street, where Mrs. Thompson's and Mrs. Kelly's were then 
burning, and the squares in front of me were threatened. 
The wind at length became so high and the fires in front and 
on our right hand so near and so threatening that we all con- 



180 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



eluded our dwelling must go, and, gathering what we could 
carry, left it in a body, intending to try and get to L. F. 
Hopson's, East end of Camden street. My wife was quite 
sick and weak, but we reached Mr. Hopson's all tired out and 
were readily allowed house room. By his advice I went over 
to Mrs. English's, where he said a Major had promised 
safety to its inmates. Found there Joseph Cooper, Mrs. 
Kennerly and some others, but could not see the Major. 
Returned to Hopson's, and, leaving my family, went back 
home, where my faithful guard still stood at the front door, 
as I had requested him to do. 

The streets, lit up as bright as day, were occupied by men, 
women and children, standing or sitting by such household 
goods, furniture, clothing and bedding, as they had saved from 
their burning houses. The \vind showed no sign of abating, 
but it gradually changed and came from the Northeast, blow- 
ing back upon the fire and saving my premises. Went to Mr. 
Dovilliers' and helped his wife put two or three big pictures 
in frames on her head, which she carried over to my house, 
and thence beyond the Female College, where her husband 
and his mother were in the street. Whilst there Pelham's 
house, just opposite, took fire, and with Dr. Wm. Reynolds, 
Jr., I carried water from Dovilliers' well to put it out. Mike 
Brennan, in Pelham's door, called on three or four soldiers in 
the street to assist in saving the building, but one of them 
said, ''d — n the house, let it burn!" and they did nothing. 
It burnt, and Sam Muldrow's next door. There the fire 
stopped in our street. On the way to Dovilliers' I met a 
Yankee soldier, who accosted me with the question, " Well, 
old man, what do you think of the Yankees now?" I replied, 
"I think they have done their work pretty thoroughly this 
time," and he rejoined, with an oath, "Yes, if you want a 
job well done put a Yankee at it!" Going back to Hop- 
son's, about daylight, I took my wife and daughter to the 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 181 



front gate of R. M. Johnson's^ house, where we met Caleb 
BoLiknight, who then occupied the place — at present the 
Benedict Institute. Leaving them with him, I came back 
home. Thus passed a night of horrors such as this genera- 
tion has not witnessed. Our streets and vacant lots were full 
of homeless families, with a few articles saved from the flames, 
many having nothing but the clothes they wore, for when 
bringing bedding, provisions or raiment out of their dwell- 
ings they were plundered or destroyed by the brutal soldiers, 
who jeered and exulted in their fiendish work. The Metho- 
dist Church, on Washington street, was set on fire three times 
before its destruction was completed, Mr. Conner, the 
clergyman in charge, who lived in the parsonage adjoining, 
having twice put out the fire. When they burnt the parson- 
age he brought out a sick child wrapped in a blanket, and on 
one of the soldiers seizing the blanket he begged that it 
might be spared because of the child's sickness. The brute 
tore it off and threw it into the flames, saying, " D — n you, 
if you say a word I'll throw the child after it !" 

The fruits of more than a half century's cares and labors 
were thus destroyed in a single night, and where at sunset on 
the 17th stood one of the fairest cities on the continent, by 
daylight the next morning nothing remained but heaps of 
smoking ruins, with here and there a solitary chimney to 
mark where the houses had been. Every building but one — 
and that a little one — on both sides of Main street for a mile 
in length above the State House was reduced to ashes, and a 
great number on other streets, especially on the East side, for 
three or more squares, were in the same condition. 

The Phoenix soon after the fire contained a publication by 
Wm. Gilmore Simms, in which he estimated the aggregate 
losses as covering 84 out of 124 squares, including the old 
State House, 6 churches, 11 banking establishments, besides 
railroad depots, schools, shops and stores, with the names of 



182 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



445 merchants and tradesmen burned out on Main street and 
1,200 watches taken from private individuals. 

Saturday, i8th. — Early this morning, my family having 
returned, Wm. Harth and his wife, with two children, a 
niece and a couple of negroes, walked in and helped for three 
weeks to consume the scanty supply of eatables that I had 
saved. They had spent a part of the night in an open lot, 
after the burning of M. A. Shelton's house, where they had 
taken refuge with two wagon loads of provisions and their 
carriage and horses, coming from lower Lexington to Colum- 
bia for safety. Nearly all they brought is burnt. 

Great alarm prevails lest the remainder of the city shall 
be consumed to-night, as the soldiers threaten will be done. 
As some of them marched up Pickens street this morning, 
they cried out in front of my door, "This house shall go 
to-night." 

At 2 o'clock I called at General Wood's headquarters in 
William. A. Harris's house on Gervais street for a guard, and 
was told that one would be placed at every door within two 
hours, but that time expired and no guard came. Near 
night, Henry's wife and Miss Gardner went to the General 
and he promised to send us sufficient protection in an hour, 
but it was not done. William Harth's guard, a Mr. Burgess, 
and another came, however, and stayed with my faithful 
watch. Ruble. I lay on a sofa in the front room with a pistol 
in my pocket that night, and several subsequently, but all was 
as quiet as the grave. 

Sunday, February igth — This morning, as Mayor Good- 
wyn was passing my gate, I met him, and proposed that we, 
with a few other citizens, should apply to General Wood or 
Howard for the means of feeding and protecting our people 
till supplies could be received from abroad. He agreed, and 
on the way we gathered Revs. Nicholas Talley, Thomas 
Raysor and Mr. Conner, also Dr. C. H. Miot and Messrs. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 183 



J. J. McCarter, the bookseller, and W. M. Martin, of Charles- 
ton, the broker. Dr. Goodwyn, the Mayor, proposed that 
he should act as our spokesman, as his office and his acquaint- 
ance with the officers would add weight to our petition, and 
we made no objection. General Wood, after hearing the 
Mayor, refused his request, saying it was unreasonable and 
unprecedented, but he referred us to General Howard, who 
he said was officer of the day. Him we found encamped in 
rear of the College, near W. H. Gibbes's present residence. 
He also objected to the application, but proposed going with 
us to General Sherman, and we all proceeded to Blanton 
Duncan's house, on Gervais street, where the Commander-in- 
Chief was quartered. He received us very courteously in- 
deed, seeming to be on particularly good terms with himself, 
showing by the way he pulled down his vest and looked at 
himself, and by every other indication of manner and tone, 
his supreme pride and gratification at his success. No pea- 
cock ever manifested more vanity and delight than he did, 
when, addressing us, he said : ''Gentlemen, what can I do for 
you ? You ought to be at church ; I myself thought of going 
to hear Mr. Shand." «Mr. Talley replied: ''Ah, General, 
our church is burnt." He then invited us all to take seats, 
and Mayor Goodwyn stated our condition, with twenty thou- 
sand old men, women and children, having no provisions or 
•means of defense against the disorderly soldiers and negroes, 
and requested a supply of arms and ammunition, with food 
enough to keep us alive till we could communicate with the 
country. 

General Sherman replied in a long lecture or harangue on 
our folly in beginning the war, the subject of slavery, the 
mismanagement of Beauregard, the condition of Georgia, 
&c., &c. The fire, he admitted, was caused by his troops, 
saying: "It is true our men have burnt Columbia, but it was 
your fault." And when Dr. Goodwyn inquired, " How so, 



184 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



General?" he replied that our people had made his soldiers 
drunk, citing an instance of a druggist who he was told 
brought out a pail of whisky to them. Dr. Miot here inter- 
rupted him to remark that he was a druggist, but he had 
heard of no such case. Mr. McCarter also stated that a 
soldier had demanded his watch, while pointing a pistol at 
his head, but the General only laughed and told him that he 
ought to have resisted. He concluded by consenting to 
leave us 500 head of beef cattle, 100 muskets and ammuni- 
tion, all the salt at the Charleston Railroad depot, and wire 
enough to work a flat across the river. He also promised 
that his Surgeon General should turn over to us some medi- 
cine for the use of the sick in our midst. This, he said, was 
contrary to usage, but I thought his treatment of Columbia 
liable to the s-ame remark. Some of us went to the depot, 
where we found 60 or 80 tierces of salt, which General 
Howard agreed to haul to the new State House for us. While 
on the way we saw the gas works on fire. 

General Sherman, in his discourse to us, never named nor 
alluded to General Hampton or the burning of the cotton as 
causing the fire. Yet in his official report, which was prob- 
ably made the same day, he charged it to Hampton, 
acknowledging, as it seems to me, that he knew the charge 
to be false at the time. I quote his own words : "In my 
official report of this conflagration I distinctly charged it to 
General Wade Hampton, and confess I did so pointedly to 
shake the faith of his people in him, for he was in my 
opinion a braggart and professed to be the special champion 
of South Carolina." [See Sherman's Memoirs, Vol. H, 
page 287.] 

Surely any comment on this precious confession would be 
superfluous, since it discloses, in a single sentence, the char- 
acter of its author and the length to which he will go in deal- 
ing with an opponent. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 185 



In his Memoirs he says further: ''Many of the people 
thought the fire was deliberately planned and executed. This 
is not true. It was accidental, and, in my judgment, began 
with the cotton which General Hampton's men had set fire to 
on leaving the city." 

Thus it appears that he gave three different versions of the 
origin of the fire, each one varying from and inconsistent 
with the other two, to wit: First, that it was caused by his 
men; second, by General Hampton; and third, by accident. 

Which, if either, is to be believed? 

I have no hesitation in saying the first, for the following, 
among other reasons : 

1. Because he knew, and he said so voluntarily on the 
second day after it occurred, while it was fresh in his mind, in 
the presence of our citizens named above and a half dozen or 
so of his own officers of the highest rank, who knew the 
facts, and who by their silence acquiesced in and endorsed 
its correct^iess, since they would hardly have allowed so grave 
a charge against their men to pass without a contradiction if 
they had known it to be untrue. 

2. On page 288 of xhis Memoirs occurs this passage: 
"Having utterly ruined Columbia, the right wing took up its 
march Northward," &c. 

3. General Howard, while in Columbia in 1867, called on 
Governor Orr at his office, above stairs in the Branch Bank 
building, my bank and broker's office being on the first floor. 
There he met, besides Governor Orr, General Hampton, 
General John S. Preston, James G. Gibbes and F. G. de Fon- 
taine. General Hampton came down from the Executive 
office to mine and said to me: "I have just left General 
Howard up stairs, and was greatly pleased to hear him say, in 
conversing upon the burning of this place: 'It is useless to 
deny that our troops burnt Columbia, for I saw them in the 
act.' " I understand General Howard made a similar state- 
ment to Colonel L. D. Chi Ids the same day. 



186 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



James G. Gibbes says: ''I was present in the office of 
Governor Orr some time in 1867, when General Howard, 
then visiting Columbia, was there. When General Hampton 
entered. Governor Orr introduced him to General Howard. 
The first thing General Hampton said was, ' General Howard, 
who burned Columbia?' General Howard laughed and said, 
'Why, General, of course we did.' But afterward qualified 
it by saying, ' Do not understand me to say that it was done 
by orders.' " 

Rev. Peter J. Shand reports that General Howard told 
him in Charleston, in November, 1865: " Though General 
Sherman did not order the burning of the town, yet some- 
how or other the men had taken up the idea that if they de- 
stroyed the capital of South Carolina it would be peculiarly 
gratifying to General Sherman." 

General Howard is said to have denied all this on oath in 
some trial at Washington, probably before the Mixed Com- 
mission on British Cotton Claims. But General Sherman was 
there at the time, and that fact, with the difference in latitude, 
may account for his making one statement in Columbia and 
another entirely different at Washington, forgetting at one 
place what he remembered at another. 

4. I have mingled with the people of Columbia ever since 
the fire, except when occasionally absent for a short time, and 
have conversed on the subject with all classes, old and young, 
rich and poor, male and female, white and colored, and 
among them all have never heard it attributed to any other 
cause, many giving instances of the troops carrying from 
house to house balls of rags or cotton saturated with spirits of 
turpentine, and calling on the inmates to come out, when 
they set fire to the buildings and robbed them of their con- 
tents. 

5. Because these same troops burnt Orangeburg, Blackville, 
Lexington, Winnsboro, Camden and Cheraw, besides hun- 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 187 



dreds of private residences in the country. Colonel Stone, 
who received the surrender of Columbia, published a state- 
ment, some years ago, describing the destruction of dwellings 
and desolation of the country wherever their army marched 
throughout the State. And there is no pretense that any of 
these were accidental or caused by burning cotton. 

Then, as to Hampton's causing the fire, Sherman's own 
confession puts the innocence of the former beyond doubt. 

In f:ivor of the accidental burning, he dismisses the subject 
by saying in his Memoirs, page 287 : ''This whole subject has 
since been thoroughly and judicially investigated, in some 
cotton cases, by the Mixed Commission of American and 
British Claims, under the treaty of Washington, which Com- 
mission failed to find a verdict in favor of the English claim- 
ants, and thereby settled the fact that the destruction of prop- 
erty in Columbia, during that night, did not result from the 
acts of the General Government of the United States — that 
is to say, from my army." 

Unfortunately for General Sherman, that verdict settled 
nothing but the British claims in the cotton cases then tried, 
and, as I hope to show, dt was founded on defective and in- 
correct testimony. The higher claims of truth, justice and 
humanity were neither considered nor settled by it. These 
concerned the citizens of Columbia and involved interests 
infinitely superior, in character and extent, to the value of all 
the cotton. They could not be settled by a mere inference 
or implication on a side issue in a case between entirely dif- 
ferent parties, tried by a tribunal created for a different and 
distinct purpose. I understand the issue before the Commis- 
sion was whether the Government had taken cotton belong- 
ing to British claimants, and was decided in the negative, 
because the cotton was burnt and therefore could not have 
been taken. Who burnt the town was another question, into 
which the Commission had no right to inquire and did not 



388 EANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



enter. To pass upon it a Court or Commission should 
have met in Cohnnbia, where the transaction occurred and the 
facts were best known, instead of at Washington, five hun- 
dred miles distant, under the influence of the United States 
Government and of General Sherman. To give some idea 
of the evidence that would have been submitted in that case, 
and how it was procured, I will state that when Sherman's 
charge against Hampton became known in Columbia, a pub- 
lic meeting was held to provide for collecting the testimony 
in relation to the destruction of the city, and that Chancellor 
J. P. Carroll, lately deceased, as Chairman of a Committee 
appointed for that purpose, received more than sixty deposi- 
tions and statements in writing from as many individuals. I 
quote from his report an outline of its contents. This report, 
I understand, is to be published in full by Chancellor Car- 
roll's family: 

"The array of witnesses is impressive, not merely because 
of their number, but for the high tone and elevated character 
of some, the unpretending and sterling probity of others, and 
the general intelligence and worth of all. The plain and 
unvarnished narrative subjoined is taken from the testimony 
referred to, solely and exclusively, except so much as refers 
to certain declarations of General Sherman and the forces 
under his command, t- ^ ^^ xhe soldiers were universal 
in their threats; they seemed to gloat over the distress that 
would accrue from their march in the State. General Sher- 
man himself said to a lady of his acquaintance : ' Go off the 
line of the railroad. I will not answer for the consequences 
where the army passes.' 

''Extracts from his address at Salem, Illinois, in July, 1865 : 
' I resolved in a moment to give up the game of guarding 
their cities and to destroy their cities.' For eighty miles 
along the route of his army, then the most highly improved 
and cultivated region of the State, the habitations of but two 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 189 



white persons remain, and if a single town or village or 
hamlet within the line of march escaped altogether the torch 
of the invaders the Committee have not been informed of 
the exception. * * >i^ Before the surrender of the town, 
the soldiers of General Sherman, officers and privates, 
declared that it was to be destroyed. At Lexington, on the 
1 6th February, General Kilpatricksaid in reference to Colum- 
bia: 'Sherman will lay it in ashes for them.' A Federal 
Lieutenant on the 17th wrote to Mrs. McCord: 'My heart 
bleeds to think of what is threatening; leave the town, go 
anywhere to be safer than here.' To W. H. Orchard the 
leader of a squad said : ' If you have anything you wish to 
save, take care of it at once, for before morning this d'nd 
town will be in ashes. If you watch, you will see three rockets 
go up soon. If you don't take my advice, you will see hell.' 
Within an hour afterwards three rockets were seen to ascend, 
and but a few minutes elapsed before fires in quick succession 
broke out at intervals so distant that they could not have 
been communicated from one to the other. At various parts 
of the town the soldiers of General Sherman at the appear- 
ance of the rockets declared that they were the appointed 
signals for a general conflagration. * * The soldiers with 
bayonets and axes pierced and cut the hose, disabled the 
engines and prevented the citizens from extinguishing the 
flames. * * By 3 o'clock A. M. on the night of 17th 
February, 1865, more than two- thirds of the town lay in 
ashes, comprising the most highly improved and the entire 
business part of it. * * That Columbia was burned by the 
soldiers of General Sherman, that the vast majority of the in- 
cendiaries were sober, that for hours they were seen with com- 
bustibles firing house after house, without any affectation of con- 
cealment and without the slightest check from their officers, is 
established by proof full to repletion, and wearisome from its 
very superfluity. After the destruction of the town, his ofifi- 



190 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



cers and men openly approved of its burning and exulted in 
it. It was said by numbers of the soldiers that the order had 
been given to burn down the city. There is strong evidence 
that such an order was actually issued in relation to the house 
of General John S. Preston. The proof comes from the 
Mother Superior of the Ursuline Convent, which was de- 
stroyed by the fire. She says General Sherman offered her 
next morning any house she might select for the use of her 
Convent and directed Colonel Ewing to carry out the offer. 
When she told Colonel Ewing that she chose General Pres- 
ton's house, he replied, 'That is where General Logan holds 
his headquarters, and orders have already been given to burn 
it to-morrow morning, but if you say you will take it I will > 
speak-to the General.' On the following morning we learned 
from the officer in charge, (General Perry, I think,) that 
orders were to fire it unless a detachment of the Sisters were 
in actual possession. 

''As to the cotton, Generals Beauregard and Hampton 
ordered it not to be burned. These orders were issued by 
Captain Rawlins Lowndes, then acting as Hampton's Adju- 
tant, and General M. C. Butler, who was with the rear 
squadron of the Confederate cavalry, deposes that Hampton 
directed him that the cotton was not to be burnt; that this 
direction was communicated to the entire division and was 
strictly observed. Rev. A. Toomer Porter was told by 
General Hampton: 'The cotton is not to be burnt; the 
wind is too high ; it might catch something and give Sherman 
an excuse for burning the town.' Mayor Goodwyn deposes 
that Hampton said the same to him. "^ * The wind blew 
from the West, but the fires at night broke out West of Main 
and Sumter streets, where the cotton bales were, and instead 
of burning the houses was probably burnt by them." 

Moreover, James G. Gibbes says in his communication of 
September, 1880, to the Weekly Times, Philadelphia: "The 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 191 



fire continued throughout the night, the streets being 
crowded all the time with soldiers, but no officers were to be 
seen. I did see General Sherman riding leisurely through the 
streets, smoking a cigar, but he gave no orders and seemed 
to take little interest in what was going on. No one could 
witness the scene without the firm conviction that the soldiers 
were given to understand that they had free license to do as 
they pleased, and that there would be no restraint over them. 
I spent almost the entire night in the streets and witnessed 
many houses fired by the soldiers, and I never saw (nor did I 
ever see any one who did) a single instance in which any 
assistance was rendered by the soldiers to save property from 
the flames. =h * i am satisfied that, looking from the upper 
part of my house, I saw not less than eight hundred to a 
thousand men engaged in probing the ground with their bayo- 
nets or iron ramrods, searching for buried treasures. The 
storm of fire raged with unabated fury until daylight or a 
little later, when my attention was drawn to a number of 
cavalry, in squads of three or four, galloping through the 
streets, sounding their bugles and calling on the soldiers to 
fall into ranks. This was the first sign of any attempt at dis- 
cipline or the issuing of any orders to the rank and file. I 
understood immediately that the worst was over, and so it 
was. * * The track of fire was just in the rear of my own 
dwelling and approaching it so rapidly that all who were with 
me had abandoned it, and I had prepared to leave also, when 
I noticed the orders for falling into ranks. In less than 
thirty minutes after the orders were given every straggler was 
in ranks and the destruction virtually over. Nowhere was the 
discipline of Sherman's army more conspicuous than in the 
quick, prompt and immediate recognition of their orders to 
stop from any further destruction of the city. It seemed 
like magic. All was quiet and orderly as if the men were on 
dress parade, when but a moment before it seemed as if to 
ruin and destroy was the only thing thought of." 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Now, if all this testimony had been submitted to the Mixed 
Commission, or to any other fair tribunal sitting in Columbia, 
and if General Howard had testified to what he told General 
Hampton, Colonel Childs, James G. Gibbes and Rev. Mr. 
Shand and others, I risk nothing in saying what their verdict 
would and ought to have been. But why multiply words in 
so plain a case? General Sherman was in command; he 
knew the feelings of his men towards the people of Colum- 
bia; he admitted that he had the power to control them 
when he said to Mayor Goodwyn : *'Go home and rest 
assured that your city will be as safe in my hands as if you 
had controlled it ;" and he turned his trooj^s loose in the 
place without any restraint whatever, until they had destroyed 
enough of it to satisfy his vanity and malice ; then he ordered 
the work to stop, and it did stop. Whether they were drunk 
or sober is immaterial. He did exactly what one would have 
done who wanted the town destroyed, and he alone is respon- 
sible for the consequences, and doubly responsible, because 
he voluntarily promised protection and purposely failed to 
take any step towards even trying to fulfill his promise. 

If a transaction witnessed by forty or fifty thousand people 
can be successfully falsified, of what value is human testi- 
mony, or how can we rely upon any fact stated in history? 

Sunday, igth. — After the interview with General Sherman, 
I summoned James G. and Dr. R. W. Gibbes, Jr., Clark 
Waring, D. P. McDonald, Dr. Wm. Reynolds and others, 
about a dozen in number, to meet at my house to-night and 
arrange for receiving the guns and cattle to-morrow. 
General Howard having notified Mayor Goodwyn that they 
would be turned over to us at 6 o'clock A. M. They met 
and Dr. Goodwyn was present. James G. Gibbes, Mr. Dovil- 
liers and others agreed to get the guns, which were at the 
Asylum, while another party was to gviafd the cattle then in 
the College Campus. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 193 



Monday, 20th. — The citizens were notified to meet at 9 
o'clock in Mrs. Lyons's yard and arrange for the protection 
of the place ; but very few appeared. The guns turned over 
to us by General Sherman were found to be plugged with 
sand, either designedly or from disuse, and gunsmiths were 
employed to remove the sand before they could be used. By 
12 o'clock about a hundred had assembled and Captain Stan- 
ley was appointed to command the guard. Whilst a commit- 
tee, with Mayor Goodwyn, were arranging for detail of 
guards, Rev. Mr. Toomer Porter announced an order from 
General Howard for us to take charge of the city above Cam- 
den street at 2 o'clock, as his forces in that quarter were 
marching out, and Captain Stanley ordered ten or a dozen 
for that purpose. Sherman's army were departing all day, 
and he directed us to put to death all stragglers found in our 
streets. 

Tuesday, 21st. — I met City Council at J. M. Blakely's 
house, where the Aldermen made their first report to the 
Mayor since the arrival of Sherman's army. Decided to send 
Mr. Blakely to Pacolet for provisions belonging to Supply 
Association managed by M. C. Mordecai. At 12 o'clock a 
public meeting was held in State House yard, where we agreed 
to enroll all needing food and to call on those having any to 
spare to give it for others. T. J. Robertson offered money 
and provisions. David Jacobs, A. L. Solomons and Mr. 
Edgerton each ^5,000 in currency, and the latter ^50 in 
gold. I consented to serve on the Committee of enrollment 
with A. G. Baskin, and we took seats in Plain street, at 
Rhett's mill, where we registered many names. Mr. Brooks 
offered to build a flat for crossing Broad River. At night, 
with Clark Waring, young Cohen, Rev. T. Raysor and D. P. 
McDonald, patrolled around our square till after 12 o'clock, 
but found all very quiet. On Wednesday, and for a week or 
more afterwards, pursued same course. 



li)i RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



This week Waring and Brooks made a flat, but in trying to 
cross the river the wire broke. My son Henry had left us on 
the morning of the 17th to join Hampton's retreating troops, 
and we got quite uneasy at hearing nothing from or of him 
till March 12th, when C. J. BoUin told me he and J. B. Glass 
had spent a night with Mark Brown, at Winnsboro, on their 
return from Charlotte, and had gone to Cokesbury for pro- 
visions. 

March i^th. — The continued rains and the bungling of 
those in charge of the ferries have prevented our receipts of 
food and communication with the country, except occasion- 
ally. Augusta sent us eighteen wagon loads, but they were 
left over the river and mostly stolen. The first arrival of 
provisions was brought in two wagons by Wm. J. Anderson 
and Rev. J. Leighton Wilson, from Sumter, the loads made 
up by themselves, Captain Wm. Harris and others. I had 
written there and up the country, informing my friends of 
our condition, and this cargo was in response to my appeal. 
About the same time Morris Strauss, at Cokesbury, sent us a 
wagon load or two, which were unfortunately stopped at New- 
berry. James G. Gibbes has acted as Mayor in place of Dr. 
Goodwyn, who became completely worn out from fatigue and 
anxiety when Sherman left us. . Gibbes, by common consent, 
was the only man here with energy and capacity for the occa- 
sion. He seemed to never tire or relax his efforts, going 
everywhere, listening to all complaints, attending all calls, 
talking, eating and drinking as he went, and his services to 
the city were beyond all computation or compensation, yet 
he never charged or received a single cent, and seemed glad 
for once in his life to have on hand as much as he could do. 
I have served daily in distributing tickets for food; have met 
a Committee with Dr. Gibbes, Dr. John Fisher, Messrs. 
Edgerton, J. K. Crawford and D. P. McDonald for the trial 
of disorderly negroes, who need checking these lawless times, 



KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 195 



and have attended meetings of a Committee of City Coimcil 
with Mr. Kerrison and Colonel Heyward, deputed by the 
Governor to collect and distribute supplies. The five hun- 
dred beeves left us by General Sherman proved to be the 
starving cattle that his foragers had collected on their march, 
and were miserably poor, yet they served to keep our people 
alive for some weeks, a ration of a pound of this wretched 
beef and a quart of meal per day being issued to the number 
of 7,000 applicants whom we had enrolled. The supply of 
medicine for our 20,000 population, received by Dr. Gibbes 
from the Federal Surgeon General, was in a box that would 
have held one or two hundred cigars, with a pint bottle of 
castor oil. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

My Trip Up the Rivek — End of the War — Visit to Salt Works — 
Election to the Legislature — Copartnership with George W. 
Williams— Bank Robbery— Connection with Southern, Baldwin 
AND Shiver — Reconstruction — Failure in Health and Business — 
Seven Springs Mass — Rhymes. 

On the 15th I consented, by request of Council, to go up 
Broad River by boat, to hire, purchase or have built other 
boats for bringing down provisions, since, from scarcity of 
horses and wagons, they cannot reach us by land. 

Sunday, igth. — Took passage in Captain Hughes's boat at 
Geiger's Mill, with Colonel Wm. Shiver, Dr. Honour, Dr. 
Muckenfuss, Mr. Burdell of Bank of State, Mr. Brown of 
Union and others — some going in another boat. The river 
was high and rain fell nearly all the time. We slept of 
nights in a wet camp on the river bank. 



19(5 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Wednesday, 22d. — A batteau took me from the boat across 
the river to Henderson's Island, which is two and a half miles 
long by three-quarters wide at the broadest point. Walked 
across the island to Mrs. Henderson's, on the West side, and 
thence was directed and helped by way of Reuben Lyles's 
and Wm. E. Hardy's to W. W. Renwick's, who went with 
me to George B. Tucker's, on Enoree, in search for boats, but 
the latter was not at home. From there we proceeded to 
Wm. Glenn's, an old boatman, who gave me the desired 
information as to the cost and building of such boats as we 
needed. At Robert Beaty's and ex-Governor Gist's I had a 
kind and welcome reception, with conveyance to Union, 
where Dr. Herndon took me in charge, and I enjoyed the 
hospitality of his house till I met with R. V. Gist, manager 
of the Iron Works, on Broad River, and he agreed to build 
two boats and send them to Columbia as soon as possible. 
After staying a couple of days at Gist's, (where I found 
Mr. John C. Cochran, Cashier of the Southwestern Railroad 
Bank, with Mr. Henry Gourdin and Mr. Hendricks in charge 
of the bank's effects,) I returned to Pacolet and by railroad 
to Santuc, whence I went on foot to Gordon's Mills, on 
Tyger River, where, with several returning soldiers, each 
was charged fifty cents for crossing in a batteau and the same 
for riding in a wagon three miles to Wm. E. Hardy's. Mr. 
Hardy sent a boy and horse with me to Mr. Renwick's, and 
he conveyed me back to Mrs. Henderson's, on the island. 
From there Dr. Hancock brought me to the head of the 
canal, about 8 o'clock at night, on Sunday, April 9th, and I 
walked to town on the railroad track in the dark, amidst a 
shower of rain, arriving at home after 9, thoroughly fatigued. 
Robert Beaty gave me half a dozen fine hams and made a 
present of the same number to Messrs. R. O'Neale and John 
A. Crawford. The abundance of provisions in that fertile 
region, which the Yankees failed to reach, was in striking 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 197 



contrast with our utterly destitute condition in and around 
Columbia, and the kindness and liberality of the people, 
except at Gordon's Mills, was unbounded. The light from 
the burning of our city had been seen eighty miles distant 
and our calamity excited their sincerest commiseration and 
sympathy. Whilst away exciting and conflicting rumors from 
the army were afloat. On Friday, the yth, I first heard of 
the fall of Richmond, but did not believe it. After that the 
news had been confirmed, though we could get no particulars. 
On looking back to that gloomy period I miss many elderly 
citizens who had previously been hale and vigorous, but who 
gradually declined and died, I have no doubt, from trouble 
and despair at the loss of their property and the apparently 
hopeless condition of the country. Consequently, I think, 
we have fewer old men in Columbia than in former times. 
Some who had always borne the character of honest men, 
under the strong temptations of want and evil examples, 
and in the absence of all legal restraint, proved otherwise 
and took all they could lay their hands on. A few Gov- 
ernment stores that remained were robbed at night, 
while bonds, mules and wagons were appropriated to their 
own use by the officials to whom they had been en- 
trusted. The spirit of patriotism that seemed to pervade all 
classes at the beginning of the war had measurably died out, 
and in its place was the selfish greed of speculation and ex- 
tortion, especially on the necessaries of life. Able-bodied 
young men, who ought to have been in the army, sought and 
obtained exemption for the purpose of making money. Some 
gained immense fortunes in a short time, which, by the col- 
lapse of the Confederacy, were as suddenly dissipated. It 
was indeed a "time that tried men's souls." I can recall no 
single instance of one who thus "rose upon his country's 
ruin" that retained his ill-gotten gains. A few days before 
the surrender of Columbia a poor woman from the country 



198 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Spent a day in our streets trying to get a peck of salt, but 
none could be found for sale, yet after the fire hundreds of 
sacks lay open to the view in cellars and back stores^ where 
they had been concealed waiting for higher prices. A mer- 
chant reported to have made three hundred thousand dollars 
in two or three years and who hoped that salt would go to a 
hundred dollars a bushel lost his all in one night. Another, 
in a country village, who had all that heart could wish, told 
me afterwards the Yankees left him and his family without 
even a cup from which to take a drink of water. The down- 
fall of our cause was owing in a great measure to the preva- 
lence of this desire for wealth. 

This summer, for the first time since 1822, have had nothing 
to do but keep charge of the books and assets of the bank, at 
a nominal salary of ^400. In June went to the salt works in 
Southwest Virginia to collect a debt of ^100,000 due General 
John S. Preston as part purchase money for the works, but 
effected nothing beyond seeing that rich and beautiful region. 
These works, when in full operation, could turn out thirteen 
thousand bushels of salt per day. They consisted of two 
wells or springs, from which the water flowed in tubes or 
pipes, and were not more than ten feet apart, but located in 
different Counties, whose dividing line ran between them in a 
beautiful valley about half a mile wide, shut in by two ranges 
of high mountains. Near by was a long row of boilers cov- 
ered by a shed. The water was so strongly impregnated with 
saline matter that, when boiled down, a bushel of it made a 
gallon of pure fine salt as white as the driven snow. It was 
so valuable that the whole neighboring region had been 
tried by boring, but without success, no other place being 
found where it would pay to erect works. Found the whole 
country, from Chester, S. C, to Richmond, and thence to 
and beyond Lynchburg, full of Yankee soldiers, and our poor 
fellows returning home, worn out, sick and destitute. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 199 



After thinking over many projects for employment, I 
became a candidate for the Legislature, in October, with the 
intention of trying to get the office of Comptroller General 
if it should be vacant, of which there was some doubt. 
Although my candidacy was announced but three days before 
the election, the good people of Richland gave me a seat in 
the House of Representatives. There I felt more out of place 
than in any other position I have ever occupied, and became 
satisfied that making laws was not in my line. Moreover the 
Legislature decided that the Comptroller's office was not 
vacant, but belonged rightfully to Mr. Hood. I then applied 
to General Preston and to John Caldwell for capital to start 
a banking and brokerage business on joint account in Colum- 
bia, but they both declined, thinking unfavorably of the pro- 
ject, to their great regret, as frequently expressed afterwards. 
On making a like proposition to Mr. George W. Williams of 
Charleston, accompanied by letters from some mutual friends, 
he consented to give me a credit of ten thousand dollars at the 
outset, and in January, 1866, when I first made his acquaint- 
ance, we entered into a copartnership for two years, he 
furnishing the capital and I managing the business — the 
profits to be equally divided between us. It proved far more 
successful than either of us had expected, and we divided 
nineteen thousand dollars in May, 1868. A contract for its 
continuance with my son Henry as a partner was then made 
for the ensuing two years. A few days before the expiration 
of that term, when we had cleared upwards of thirty thou- 
sand dollars, our bank was broken open and robbed of its 
contents, including a large amount belonging to special 
depositors. Thus nearly all that I had made up to that time 
was lost. But I had long seen the folly of trying to accumu- 
late more of this world's goods than one needs, and felt con- 
fident that with -life and health I could recover the loss, so it 
gave me very little trouble. In fact I neither eat nor slept 



200 KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



any the less on its account. It did annoy me, however, 
as it defeated a trip to Europe, which I had intended 
making during the summer, and from which I anticipated a 
great deal of pleasure. Hitherto I never could spare time 
and money for the purpose. The very day before the robbery 
occurred at night, I had written to JMr. Williams on the sub- 
ject, and that was as near as I ever came to crossing the 
Atlantic. But I consoled myself with the reflection that I 
had passed many pleasant summers on this side and could do 
so again. 

Some curious facts connected with the robbery will now 
be mentioned, although they will take considerable time and 
space. It occurred on the night of Saturday, April i6, 
1870. When informed of it on Sunday morning, I went to 
the bank and found the vault door and the burglar-proof iron 
safe torn to pieces, our customers' trunks and boxes broken 
open, the money, bonds and other valuables missing and the 
floor covered with the wrappers and paper that had covered 
the packages. The rogues left also a box with a complete set 
of burglars' tools and implements which they had used and a 
sledge-hammer stolen from Brennan & Carroll's blacksmith 
shop, thus furnishing me with the means of going into their 
business if so disposed. As the news spread it excited great 
commotion, and quite a crowd assembled to gaze on the 
scene. Our police was altogether inefficient and unprepared 
to act in such a case, but they set to work and did their best. 
We offered a reward of ^6,000 for information sufficient to 
convict the robbers and a percentage upon the amount that 
might be recovered. Besides, some of our friends volun- 
teered to go on the different railroads and watch at certain 
points. Two or three days later a carpet-bag was found be- 
tween Logan & Graham's cotton gin and the South Carolina 
Railroad, containing various articles of clothing and some 
tools that matched like articles found on the floor of the 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 201 



bank. Further inquiry showed that three or four strangers 
had been camping some time the week before in the woods 
beyond the railroad, between the town and the river. A 
party went there on Tuesday or Wednesday morning, and 
where the camp had been one of them picked up a roll of 
paper about the size of a pipe stem, which had been torn in 
pieces and. wrapped tightly together. On unfolding the 
pieces and putting them together, they read as follows : 
''Albany, N. Y., April , 1870. J. A. Asdell, Columbia, 
S. C: Have sold my farm; will be in Augusta Thursday. 
(Signed J J. Tierney." 

Following this clue, we discovered that on the Thursday 
preceding the robbery the name of J. A. Asdell, New 
Orleans, appeared on the register of the Columbia Hotel 
among the arrivals that evening, and that he left the house 
next morning, but attracted no notice. At the telegraph 
office a stranger called about dusk on Saturday, and, inquir- 
ing if they had anything for J. A. Asdell, 'received the dis- 
patch copied above. Hence we inferred that he was the 
burglar. He was a thick-set man of dark complexion, 
dressed like a mechanic, and we could trace him no further. 
Pinkerton's detectives in New York were employed and 
they reported Jack Tierney of Albany as a fast man who 
had been concerned in negotiating some bonds stolen from a 
New York bank. He left Albany on Monday after the rob- 
bery, arrived in New York that evening, then went to Brook- 
lyn or Jersey City, where he had relatives, and thenceforth 
disappeared. I had reason to suspect certain persons in 
Columbia, belonging to the Radical party, who were then 
engaged in plundering our State, of either committing or 
employing others to commit the robbery, but in the absence 
of proof it would have been useless to prosecute them. 



203 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



Soon after the robbery occurred, Mr. Sample, a banker in 
Nashville, Tennessee, called on me in Columbia, heard an 
account of the affair and received a copy of our circular 
offering a reward and containing a list of some of the 
lost money and securities. In February, 1872, I received a 
dispatch from him stating that he was offered a large amount 
in bills of the Exchange Bank of Columbia which had been 
taken from our vault, and that if I would come to Nashville 
we might catch the thief. I immediately took the train for 
that city, and on arriving was informed of the following facts 
by Sample : That in October, 1871, a young man who called 

his name Smith had sold him several thousand dollars 

in bills of the Bank of the State of South Carolina, for which 
he paid by a check on New York to Smith's order; that he 
meantime had lost sight of and forgotten my circular show- 
ing a large amount in bills of that bank as stolen when we 
were robbed ; that later in the same day Smith called again 
just before the departure of the train for Louisville, seeming 
much hurried and excited, and offered to sell him several 
thousand dollars more in bills of the same bank ; that Smith's 
manner led him to suspect something wrong, and he proposed 
taking the bills at the same rate, on the condition that if he 
made a large profit on them Smith should be allowed a share 
of the gain on his leaving his address in New York, where 
he professed his home was; that Smith left his name and 
address on a slip of paper which lay upon his desk several 
months ; that he requested his correspondent in New York to 
be particular in noticing who presented the check for pay- 
ment, and telegraphed to Blythe, a noted detective in Louis- 
ville, to watch Smith's movements whilst there, who did so 
and reported nothing suspicious; that his check in Smith's 
favor was not presented for payment till six months after its 
issue, and then was in the hands of a little old German Jew. 
Sample then showed me a dispatch that he had received from 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 203 



Smith in New York a few days before, inquiring what he 
would give for ^13,000 in bills of the Exchange Bank of 
Columbia. This he said caused him to remember the rob- 
bery of my bank, and he replied making a fair offer for the 
bills. Smith had accepted the offer and forwarded the bills 
by Express, requesting the return of a check for the amount, 
and they were then in the Express office adjoining the Max- 
well House, where I had stopped. Before leaving home I 
ascertained that Mr. C. H. Baldwin, Receiver for the Ex- 
change Bank, had redeemed all of its issues but three or 
four thousand dollars in 1870 and deposited the redeemed 
bills in our vault for safe keeping. And as the package then 
in the Express office contained more than all the unredeemed 
bills of the bank, its contents, or a portion of them, must 
have been taken when we were robbed. When Sample 
received the package we counted the bills and found the 
amount as stated by Smith. After consulting Judge Whit- 
worth, an old Nashville Bank President, Sample set out 
immediately for New York to identify Smith and have him 
arrested and taken to Columbia on a requisition from the 
Governor of South Carolina, for which I by telegraph 
directed my son in Columbia to apply with the necessary 
affidavit. The requisition was obtained and entrusted to R. 
C. Shiver, who was about departing for New York, and was 
instructed to communicate with Sample on his arrival. To 
throw Smith off his guard till Sample could reach New York, 
we got a daily Nashville paper to strike off a few copies of 
its issue with a card announcing the death of Sample's mother- 
in-law in a neighboring town and that he had gone there to 
attend her funeral. This card was mailed to Smith in the 
name of Sample's clerk, with the promise that a check for 
the bills should be remitted on Sample's return. Pinkerton's 
Detective Agency was employed meantime to watch the office 
at Smith's hotel and arrest the person who might claim the 



204 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



letter addressed to him. One of the detectives saw the letter 
delivered to a boy, who claimed it, and followed him to a 
low groggery on a side street, where he handed it to a man 
evidently waiting for it. This man rose from his seat, passed 
his hand across his face and walked out, accompanied by a 
couple of companions. Instead of arresting him at once, 
the detective, according to his own account, dogged the party 
to another drinking house, into which they entered and 
passed through the back door, where they disappeared and 
could not be found. This occurred previous to the arrival of 
Sample and Shiver in New York. The requisition on the 
Governor of New York had to be presented to him at Albany 
for approval and certification. Then when it came back to 
New York, Sample, Shiver and Pinkerton's men searched for 
Smith and captured him at the hotel. He protested his inno- 
cence, claimed an alibi, and appealed to Shiver for an investi- 
gation. Fearing a suit for damages if they had arrested the 
wrong man. Shiver allowed an inquiry to be made before a 
New York Justice or Police Court, and was left at liberty 
to convey Smith to South Carolina if he chose to take the 
responsibility. In view of the testimony, he doubted whether 
the person arrested was Smith, and suspected that the detect- 
ives had, for a consideration, allowed the real offender to 
escape to Canada, whilst they persuaded Sample to arrest the 
wrong man. And thus ended all our efforts to arrest the 
robbers. 

The war was followed by the years of so-called reconstruc- 
tion under Radical misrule, when rogues and rascals held high 
carnival in the State and city governments, and vied with each 
other in showing the depths of infamy and corruption to which 
human nature can descend when unrestrained by law, con- 
science or public opinion. They congregated in Columbia — 
the seat of government — where jobbery and robbery were 
openly practiced and boasted of. The State debt was doubled. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 205 



the annual expenses of the Legislature were trebled and some- 
times quadrupled. New bonds authorized to be exchanged 
for old, were issued without such exchange and their proceeds 
pocketed by the officers who issued them. Coupons redeemed 
by the Treasurer, instead of being canceled, were put upon 
the market and sold for his private emolument. Judge Mel- 
ton, as Attorney General, afterwards sued him and got a ver- 
dict of ^75,000 in favor of the State. An appropriation 
bill in the Legislature, after enumerating all the extravagant 
items that could be invented, was passed with an additional 
false aggregate of, I believe, ^150,000 to its real amount. 
This was discovered by Governor Scott, and was so barefaced 
and inexcusable that he refused to give it his official signa- 
ture and approval. Joe Crews actually complained to me 
of the Governor's veto on this occasion as an outrageous 
desertion of his party. In the city government it was no 
better, as the following instances will show: 

I was a member of the Council for a part of the war time, 
and, as Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, had 
become familiar with its financial condition. On declining 
to serve, after a re-election, I publicly expressed the opinion 
that by proper management, with increased but not immod- 
erate taxation for three or four years, and the sale of the city's 
^150,000 in stock of the Greenville and the Charlotte Rail- 
roads, the entire bonded debt of ^320,000 might be paid off 
and the citizens freed from future taxation, except for current 
expenses. The overthrow of the Confederacy and the de- 
struction of the place by Sherman, of course, prevented any 
attempt at proving the correctness of my opinion. But the 
Radical party then took charge of the municipality, and in 
the face of the facts that the city had been desolated, as 
already described, and that its people were just crawling out 
of the ashes, as if determined to defeat our exertions for 
returning prosperity, they engaged in the wildest schemes of 



206 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



useless extravagance and waste. After selling and devouring 
the proceeds of our railroad stock, and when unable to meet 
the interest on their bonds as it fell due, they blindly and 
recklessly adopted the following measures : They sold the 
water works to a private individual, contracting to pay him 
for extending the pipes and supplying the place with water 
at an annual sum far exceeding what it had previously cost, 
under the pretense that the supply was insufficient, although 
it had sufficed during the war, when we had twice the popula- 
tion that has been within our bounds at any time since. 
They bargained for and commenced the building of a new 
market house, on Assembly street, in front of Gus Cooper's 
store, for his benefit, but in the course of its erection, Provi- 
dence seemed to interfere and a storm blew down the frame 
work, when it was abandoned after a considerable outlay. 
Then they started a scheme for erecting an Opera House and 
City Hal!, as if it was the duty of the Council to provide a 
place for theatrical and other performances. In their pub- 
lished proceedings they declared that the cost would not 
exceed ^75,000 and that they had the means of paying for 
it without any increase of taxation. This declaration was 
followed by an application to the Legislature for leave to 
issue ^250,000 in bonds in order to meet the expense. Mean- 
time they entered into a contract to pay Isaac A, Allen 
$142,000 for doing the work, he being, by the merest trickery 
and subterfuge, the lowest bidder at that price. The princi- 
pal taxpayers opposed the petition for power to issue new 
bonds, and applied to the Courts to set aside the contract 
with Allen, as fraudulent in character and excessive in amount. 
Judge Melton, after hearing the case, declared the contract 
null and void, and one of the previous bidders at about 
$140,000 took the job for $90,000. The Council in the 
meantime had borrowed $75,000 from Dr. Neagle to carry on 
the work, and had given him as security for the loan, a lot of 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 207 



bonds which the Legislature some years previously had author- 
ized to be issued in aid of the railroad to Augusta, but which, 
not being required or used for that purpose, had been left in 
the City Clerk's office. Neagle became dissatisfied with this 
security and demanded something else in its place. Now, 
although these facts were admitted, and could not be denied, 
the Legislature took up the matter as a party question, and, 
backed by the recommendation of the Committee of Ways 
and Means, with Whipper as Chairman, passed an Act author- 
izing the new issue, but guarded it by a provision that the 
entire indebtedness of the corporation should never in any 
event exceed ^600,000. Some of us did all we could to 
defeat the bill, or to reduce the maximum amount to $500,000. 
Tim Hurley, a member of the Committee and one of the 
most candid and impudent of the party, who said on all 
occasions that they would steal, told me privately that it 
would not cost much to defeat the bill, but my friends and I 
refused to take the hint and allowed it to pass. In spite of 
the express limitation of the city debt to $600,000, the scamps 
made it one or two hundred thousand more before we could 
stop them, and on that .increased basis it was finally com- 
promised after infinite disputation and litigation. 

Our copartnership with Mr. Williams expired in May, 1870, 
soon after the robbery, and he signified his desire to quit the 
concern, giving me time to make other arrangements. Accord- 
ingly we brought it to a close on the ist of August, without 
having had the slightest disagreement or complaint on either 
side during its continuance. He complied strictly and 
promptly with his part of the contract in furnishing funds 
when called for, and never interfered with my management 
by advice or otherwise. I then made a connection with 
Messrs. J. P. Southern, C. H. Baldwin and R. C. Shiver for 
the ensuing two years, they putting in $75,000 in cash, and 
I and my son, with assistants, attending to the business. At 



208 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



the end of that time we divided between twenty-five and 
thirty thousand dollars of profits. Thus, in the first six years 
after the war I made ^75,000 for my partners and myself, 
without dealing harshly or illiberally with any customer. 
Then Mr. Southern and Mr. Shiver, with some others, bought 
the charter of the old Union Savings Bank and urged me to 
merge my business with theirs and take the place of President 
with my son as Cashier, offering me ^5,000 for the good will 
of my concern, and ^30,000 — a profit of ^5,000 — on the cost 
of my banking house, with its fixtures, and the adjoining 
store. But we disagreed as to the salaries that I demanded 
for myself and my son, and they rented another place and 
opened the Savings Bank, while we continued on alone. 
This was in August, 1872. 

My business had grown up gradually under my management 
and control, and I had every reason to believe that it would 
continue to increase, whilst I feared disagreement with some 
of their directors and doubted the success of their scheme. 
Next year came the panic of 1873, ^^^ suspension of nearly 
all banks throughout the country, and great shrinkage of 
values in real estate and other property, with the insolvency 
of many parties hitherto regarded as abundantly good. I 
managed to meet all demands, while the National Banks in 
Columbia suspended payment for sums exceeding ^100, and 
the Citizens' Savings Bank went into bankruptcy. The uni- 
versal depression continued a number of years, with no pros- 
pect of improvement or relief Besides, in 1876, while I 
was absent, my son was taken dangerously ill and died early 
in August, four days after my return. This was a very severe 
blow to me, for he was the active out-door man in our bank. 
But, in addition, just then occurred the violent political 
agitation and elections throughout the State, for relief from 
Radical rule, absorbing the time and attention of our people 
and nearly stopping all business. And finally, in November, 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 209 



I was struck down with a chronic disease of the kidneys that 
had troubled me many years, which prevented my proper and 
necessary attention to the office and endangered my life for 
eighteen months. During this time I had dropsy, a complete 
derangement of the digestive organs, was threatened with 
hernia and confined to my bed room eight or ten months, with 
occasional attacks of nervousness, when I expected to survive 
but a few hours. Under these circumstances, which I could 
not possibly have foreseen or avoided, I made an assignment 
in June, 1877, and, owing to the depreciation in the prices 
of property and failure of debtors to meet their engagements, 
it resulted in heavy losses to my depositors, among whom 
were my only child, a daughter, and my daughter-in-law, 
who were not preferred nor cautioned to withdraw their 
money, but shared the fate of all the rest. 

From this dangerous condition, when the end was evidently 
approaching, and I had lain nearly unconscious several days, 
relief came almost miraculously. Dr. Talley, whose faithful 
and skillful attention had, with the blessing of Heaven, 
prolonged my life, told me one day of a remedy that had 
been produced in this way: A man near Abingdon, in 
Virginia, had drawn from a spring in his neighborhood 
a barrel of water and placed it over a slow fire until 
it was reduced to a pint. He then went to six other 
springs and drew from each a like quantity, which was treated 
in the same manner. These seven pints of water he mixed 
together, and by evaporation produced a mass, in color and 
consistency resembling putty, which he declared would cure 
the dropsy. It was called The Seven Spring Mass, and, to 
the surprise of every one, on trial it proved to be a specific 
for the disease, as was certified to by such men as Bishop 
Pierce of Georgia. The Doctor, with my consent, ordered 
some of the singular medicine. The dropsy in my lower 
limbs had then been growing and increasing, though very 



210 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



slowly, for about a year, while my arms showed nothing but 
skin and bone, and all my senses were seriously affected. 
Yet a small dose of the mass, in a single night, carried off all 
the accumulated water, leaving the skin that had been so long 
distended, all loose and shrivelled. A repetition of the dose 
a week or two afterwards relieved me entirely from the 
dropsy; the other symptoms of disease abated, and in the 
course of a month I crawled out to the front door. Some 
time in April my strength bore me to Main street, though 
still very weak. I feared the first person I met would take 
me by the throat with the demand : '' Pay what thou owest." 
But all seemed glad to see me; expressed their sympathy for 
my misfortunes, and one good lady, whose kindness I shall 
never forget, crossed the street to meet me, turned back in 
her way, and walked upwards of two squares to chat with me. 
From that time my health gradually improved and has since 
been as good as that of any one at my time of life. 

The effects of this medicine were so happy and wonderful 
in my case that I record them here for the benefit of others 
who may be similarly afflicted. I had always before regarded 
the dropsy as incurable, having never known a patient to 
recover from it. 



KANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 211 



^I|l ^k^mmA 



Shakspeare says: 

"All the world's a stage, 
And all the men and women merely players ; 
They have their exits and their entrances, 
And one man in his time plays many parts." 

Among the parts that I have played was, in my youthful 
days, that of a rhymer for very young ladies, who generally 
pronounced my productions be-e-aiitiful ; and now, to fill up 
some space for the printers, such as I have not forgotten will 
be coi)ied, and my long and tedious task brought to an end. 
I never kept duplicates of them, but have now and then 
rewritten one from memory for the amusement of a friend, 
and only one or two have ever been published. Those of my 
readers who have no taste for such trifles can pass them by 
without notice, as they are merely thrown in for good 
measure, and because without them my recollections would 
be incomplete. 



H BIRTHDM SONG, 



'Tis the maiden's birthday ; the sky is bright. 

The roses are blooming around ; 
There's beauty in all that meets the sight. 

And music in every sound. 

The cooing dove on the lonely hill, 

The martin high up in the air. 
And the flattering mocking bird, loud and shrill, 

Hail the birth of the young and the fair. 



212 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



The butterfly, decked in vermillion and gold, 

Calls to visit the beautiful miss ; 
And the saucy mosquito, mischievous and bold. 

Makes her blush with the warmth of his kiss. 

At midnight the whippoorwill's ceaseless cry 

Fills the woods with a serenade. 
While the firefly waves his torch on high 

As a silent huzza for the maid. 



Sweet maid of sixteen, may no sorrow or blight 
Ever furrow your cheek or your brow. 

But may time in his flight find your eye still as bright. 
And your slumbers as peaceful as now. 



WOMSN'S INFLUENCE, 



In days of yore the gallant knight 
Went forth to many a field of fight. 
Encountered peril, pain and toil — 
His sole reward, sweet woman's smile ; 
But days of knighthood now are o'er. 
Their gleaming spears are seen no more. 
Unheard their trumpets' martial strains. 
Yet woman's influence still remains. 



At her command grave, steady men, 
Unused to wield the poet's pen, 
Laying ambition, strife and pride. 
And cares and business all aside. 
And summoning from mem'ry's throng 
Thoughts that to other days belong, 
Essay to fill a vacant page 
With fancies bright or counsels sage. 
To cull a chaplet fair and sweet, 
And lay it humbly at her feet. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 218 



TWILIGHT MUSINGS 

R FRAGMENT. 



Maiden of the raven hair, kind heart and merry eyes. 
Alone I often think of you as fade the evening skies ; 
Robed in crimson drapery, when the sun retires to rest. 
Your breath is on the balmy breeze, your blush is in the West. 

'Mid gathering shades yon silver cloud reflects the absent sun, 
E'en so in mem'ry bring me back, when I from earth am gone. 
The brightest sky is farthest off, the darkest overhead. 
So shone the joys of long ago, so present sorrows spread. 



MY DREAM, 



I had a dream,* a glorious dream, of Eden's blissful bowers, 
When all was peace and happiness within this world of ours, 
And there I saw an earthly maid, most beautiful and bright, 
Who seemed to be at home amid that world of pure delight. 

A sound like that of lofty pines when swept by winter's blast, 

And a troop of white-robed angels came sailing slowly past ; 

On glittering wings, with golden harps, they hovered o'er the place. 

While the light reflected from their forms lit up the maiden's face. 

Celestial flowers in rosy wreaths around her brow they hung. 

And the air was full of melody as thus the angels sung : 

" We come to you, sweet earthly maid, our nature to impart. 

That you may be an angel in appearance and in heart ; 

Your eye shall have a brighter glance, your voice a sweeter tone. 

Your cheek a richer, deeper blush than any but your own : 

We'll guard and guide your daily walk, till daily walks shall cease — 

Your ways shall all be pleasantness, your paths shall all be peace ; 

And we'll take you up to dwell with us, if cares and troubles come. 

For you're fit for brighter regions, this dark earth is not your home.' 



214 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



They waved arewell and soared on high — my glorious dream was past ; 

Like all my dreams of happiness, too bright, too sweet to last. 

But still a rosy glow was shed on all surrounding things — 

The poplar leaves still quivered with the waving of their wings ; 

Faint echoes of their music from a distant cloud I heard, 

And a trembling flash disclosed the track by which they disappeared. 

I turned to gaze around me, too full of thought for speech. 

When lo ! that maiden's album lay just within my reach, 

Enriched with friendship's precious fruits, adorned with fancy's flowers. 

As full of pure and peaceful thoughts as Eden's blissful bowers ; 

And I this tribute added, to her beauty and her worth. 

She is fit for better regions, her true home is not on earth. 



IMPROMPTU. 

In reply to a bantering anonymous letter received by a friend. 

Dear miss, your epistle has just come to hand, 

And I would, most willingly, grant your demand 

And fly to your arms without any delay, 

But for one or two obstacles still in the way. 

In the first place, your name is a secret to me — 

It's not in your letter so far as I see. 

Then, your description has nothing peculiar to you, 

For other young ladies have eyes that are blue, 

With hair that is auburn, and they too are tall, 

And I have looked wistful and sighed to them all ; 

I cannot but sigh when I witness the grace. 

The beauty and sweetness of form and of face. 

Like stars in the darkness of midnight that shine 

To light my lone pathway, but cannot be mine. 

But then you may ask, " Can't I tell by your ' leer? ' " 

No, all ladies sometimes look cross my sweet dear. 

So you see I'm afraid I may make a mistake. 

And some other tall, blue-eyed girl chance to take. 

Besides, let me tell you, and this is no joke. 

My horse is quite lame and my sociable broke. 

Moreover, dear Miss, I would have you to know 

I'm not without some other strings to my bow ; 

Every mail brings me ofl'ers from North, East and West, 

The girls of the village allow me no rest. 

The widows look willing, and some of the wives 

Are praying their husbands would shorten their lives. 



RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 215 



So, dearest, allow me to just recommend 
That you should come over along with a friend, 
And we will be married on Saturday next. 
For I am so pestered, fatigued and perplexed 
By the banters I daily, nay, hourly, receive, 
That I'm losing my senses and strength I believe. 
Now be sure to come shortly or I will be lost. 
And your hopes, like your eyes, most confoundedly crost. 
They were afterwards married. 



THE STREIMLET. 



In the depth of the forest a streamlet I've seen, 
Spreading fragrance and verdure around ; 

The solitude smiled and the desert was green 
Where its waters had moistened the ground. 

Bright beams and soft breezes would linger and play 

O'er the ripples that dimpled its face ; 
It cooled the soft breezes and brightened the ray 

That rested within its embrace. 

In its covert the wild birds sang happy and free. 

As though earth had no shadow of care ; 
They had music and merriment, gossip and glee. 

And bridals and honeymoons there. 

As a shelter the willow his arms overspread — 

The jessamine clambered above. 
While, blushing and trembling, each flower hung its head 

Like a maid at the first kiss of love. 

That streamlet resembles the maid I address. 

To whose smile such a magic belongs ; 
Whom the beams and the breezes delight to caress. 

And the birds to salute with their songs. 

Her face, like the streamlet that flows in the wood. 

Is radiant with light from above ; 
It speaks of a heart where no shadows intrude. 

Filled with gayety, kindness and love. 

Her form is as graceful, her footstep as light. 

As the willow that dips in the tide; 
And her lips and her cheeks are as fresh and as bright 

As the flowers that spring by its side. 



216 RANDOM RECOLLECTIONS. 



The glance of her eye is like starlight at eve 

Reflected from billows at rest, 
And neither the stars nor the billows that heave 

Are more peaceful or pure than her breast. 

May friends cluster round her like leaves ever green ; 

May love join life's stream as it flows, 
Growing broader and deeper, more clear and serene. 

And joyous and bright to the close. 



TO THE QUEEN OF MM. 



1. Hail, gentle Queen ! thy reign extends 

O'er happy subjects, fair and free ; 
Thy court is thronged with loyal friends. 
Who own allegiance, all, to thee. 

2. No flatterer's falsehood cheats thine ear, 

No envious rival hates thy sway. 
But friendship kind and love sincere 
Unite to crown thee Queen of May. 

3. No trembling vassal fears thy frown. 

Thy wants no ravaged realms supply ; 
Thine are the pleasures of a crown. 
Without its crimes or miserj'. 

4. For thee we've roamed the woods and fields, 

And sought the brightest, sweetest flowers ^ 
The richest prize the garden yields 
Is found among these gifts of ours. 

5. Crown other queens with sordid gold. 

The fruit of toilsome pain and care ; 
Their hearts, like it, are hard and cold. 
Nor can their crowns with thine compare. 

6. For as these fragrant flowers entwined 

Shield and adorn thy regal brow. 

So in one band our hearts we bind 

To shelter and protect thee now. 

7. These flowers will fade, but mem'ry still 

Shall long retain this pleasing scene. 
And oft, when May decks grove and hill. 
We'll think of thee, our gentle Queen. 

THE END. 






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